Up in the Mountains

Summer is finally here!  Down here in Maryland it can get pretty hot and humid, which personally I don't really mind.  But during the summer months it's fun to travel around and experience other parts of the country.  Last summer, me and my family took a trip to Northern California.  I came back from that trip with some good Holga prints and a mind full of inspiration.  

Northern California is the land of redwoods.  These massive trees are so beautiful and grand, there is nothing like this on the east coast.  So much history can be seen just in the nature.

Theres nothing like being on top of a mountain looking out as far as the eye can see.  Everything below is so tiny.  When back on the bottom we were now the ones that felt tiny compared to all the trees.

Of course we had to stop in wine country.  It was so beautiful driving through the valleys and seeing row and rows of grape vines pass by.  I never realized how many vineyards there would be, and all of them delicious!

We took a biking wine tour, biking to 5 vineyards in a 2 mile radius.  That was a lot of fun and it was interesting to see the vines up close.  Many of the plants have been passed down from generation to generation, continuing the business and tradition. 

Traveling is where I get a big part of my inspiration.  To experience a different climate and culture helps you learn about yourself and yourself as a part of the whole.  I'm most drawn to the small plant life but to see that small plant in the greater landscape is amazing.  The intricacies of nature is a play of micro and macro and how they all work together.

I hope this summer you find yourself somewhere new and inspiring.

peace & love

Rebecca

Wallpaper Wednesday- leaves!

Today I wanted to introduce to you some of my leaf patterns.  All the patterns are versatile being turned into fabrics, wallcoverings, or hand painted directly onto the walls.  I experimented with different color ways and found that by changing one color, the same pattern had a much different feel.  The choice of color influences if the pattern will be bold or subtle.  Take a look through some of my patterns!

Mix of Leaves, grey on cream

Mix of Leaves, line grey on cream

Pincherry, cream on light blue

Pincherry, cream on light orange

Pincherry, red on light orange

Pachysandra, burnt orange on cream

Pachysandra, red on light orange red

Pachysandra, burnt orange on turquoise

Below is the Pachysandra design applied as a HandPainted wall treatment.  The HandPainted treatment is more organic and painterly, something that is hard to achieve with a wallpaper.  It can be customized to any interior in any color combination!    

HandPainted Pachysandra

HandPainted Pachysandra

HandPainted Pachysandra

As you can see, all of the designs can be applied in any color.  Choose your favorite color combinations and for HandPainted choose your favorite paint colors.  I will make sure to match up the perfect color combination suitable for any room.

I hope you enjoyed these designs, there are more to come!  If you are interested in an original HandPainted wall treatment or wallpaper, please contact me at rebeccazerby@gmail.com or leave a comment, I would love to hear what you think! 

As always check out my inspirations at my Pinterest page pinterest.com/rebeccazerby93/ and my complete works at rebeccazerby.com

peace & love

Rebecca

Fabrics- New Arrivals

My first shipment of textiles arrived last week!  I'm so excited to have finally found a site that will print my designs onto a variety of fabrics, wallcoverings and papers.  It has been a dream of mine to have and use textiles with my own images printed on.  I have played around with screenprinting patterns on fabrics but its a much different look and feel than a digitally printed fabric.  I will still incorporate a silkscreen element to some of my textiles, but for now here are some of my new textiles!  

My textiles are based on abstracted plant forms.  I've taken pictures of plants, changed up the colors, then arranged the images.  Repeating, flipping and mirroring the image to create an abstracted ink blot effect.

The BlackPalm Collection is inspired from a Holga print I took down in Charleston of a palm tree.  I played around with different color ways, orientation and repeats of the image.

Below are the different colors I was playing around with.  The bright color are fun for summer but they can also be done in more neutral colors.

PinkBlue Palm

YellowGreen Palm

YellowTurq Fern

GreyBlue Palm

Being the start of summer I was drawn to the bright bold colors, which I think would be fun to brighten up a room.  Its fun to take a risk with such a bold color and pattern when its a temporary element, like a pillow or tablecloth.  I hope you enjoyed my new creations!

As always check out my inspirations on my Pinterest page pinterest.com/rebeccazerby93/ and my complete works at rebeccazerby.com

If you are interested in any of these patterns please contact me at rebeccazerby@gmail.com or leave a comment, I would love to hear what you think!

peace & love

Rebecca

Passion and Plants

Do you ever get excited by a color, or a freshly painted wall.  I have a true passion for what I do.  It's crazy to think that something so simple as painting a wall and transforming a room can be truly exciting.  I just want to share this passion with as many people. To truly be happy doing what you love is a rarity. 

It always comes back to the painting.  There is something therapeutic about combining shapes and colors into one large abstract painting.  Its one large puzzle that only I know the answer to.  Below is the Leaves Collection, all inspired by the leaves of native trees.  

Salix Alba, 20"x16"

Cornus in Winterwhite, 36"x36"

Leaves in Blue, 30"x24"

Jamaica- Philodendron laucrea, 30"x30"

The Cornus Family, 4'x2',

Transforming such a simple form into shape and color, playing with size and proportion gives each painting its own aura.  As you can see I started with the same idea but by changing the color or size, each painting grew into something unique.  

I will leave you with a great quote by Edgar Degas, "Art is not what you see, it's what you make other people see."

As always check out my inspirations on my Pinterest page pinterest.com/rebeccazerby93/  and my complete works at rebeccazerby.com 

Please feel free to contact me at rebeccazerby@gmail.com if you are interested in anything you have seen!  Or leave a comment, I would love to hear what you think!

peace & love

Rebecca

Wallpaper Wednesday!

Welcome to Wallpaper Wednesday!  Every Wednesday I will share with you something new from my wallpaper and hand painted wall treatment collections. 

First I want to introduce you to what I specialize in, hand painted wall treatments.  It’s my idea of a mural but its painted in the bold (or soft) patterns of wallpaper.  I specialize in organic floral patterns that are painted boldly.  The simplicity of the line or solid shape of the leaf lends itself to a perfect pattern.  Something as simple as changing the color or size can change the aura of the design.

the Cornus wall

The murals below are inspired from paintings I have done, that I've always wanted to paint on a large scale.  The leaves overlap creating new shapes that I then fill in with a different color.  There is no method to my madness but the final product os always a balanced composition of shapes and colors.  It is a very bold image but the neutral colors tone it down and it is a really peaceful mural.

At the University of Delaware, I majored in Fine Arts and minored in Landscape Horticulture.  I found it a great source of inspiration and I truly enjoyed learning all the different plant life.  All the leaves in my paintings are accurate depictions of leaves from trees indigenous to the Eastern United States.  It is the simplicity of the a leaf that I found so beautiful.  There is a great range of size and shape, and a leaf can be graceful, rigid, or geometric. 

I hope you enjoyed these designs, there are more to come!  If you are interested in an original hand painted wall treatment, please contact me at rebeccazerby@gmail.com.  As always you can see all of my inspirations on my Pinterest page pinterest.com/rebeccazerby93/and all my other projects at rebeccazerby.com       

peace & love

Rebecca

Welcome

Welcome!  I am Rebecca Zerby and I am an artist with a passion for interior design and textiles.  I am creating this blog to share all of my inspirations and creations.  My inspirations come from the earth, hence “de la terre”.   It’s a simple idea but these designs transform and grow into something much larger. 

I travel a lot and it is the diverse flora and fauna in each region that greatly interests me.  Recently I haven't left home without my Holga camera.  It's a film camera that produces square images that can overlap on the edges.  It is from these pictures that my inspirations come.  Here are some of the Holga prints from my recent trip to Charleston and Savannah. enjoy!

I hope these pictures inspire you as much as they do me.  Check out more of my inspirations on my Pinterest page http://pinterest.com/rebeccazerby93/and on my website   www.rebeccazerby.com

peace & love 

Rebecca