Earlier this Spring I responded to an open call for artists to provide illustrations for a Timeline wall for the new Living Barracks Museum here in Berwick-upon-Tweed. The brief seemed made for me, as someone who read History at University and has had a lifelong interest in heritage and as a Berwick-based illustrator looking to work on some more challenging commissions - and I’m so pleased to share that I was accepted to work on the project!

As we kick-off another new financial year, I thought it would be helpful to reintroduce Coostie Illustration and Design, with a little bit of information about what I do and how you can work with me.

The RSPB Big Garden Birdwatch is fast-approaching (24th - 26th January 2025) and I thought I’d take this moment to share with you why I love taking part in this citizen science project to observe and record the birds that visit my garden, what I do to prepare and how the activity inspires my art.

I’ve had my Folksy shop since July 2023 and thought it would be interesting to share a bit about why I use this platform for selling my range of eco-friendly art prints and gifts.

There are quite a few ‘easy wins’ that I’ve already made to try to ensure that the making of my art is having a minimal impact on the environment, including around the sketchbooks I use as well as my media. I’m planning to make 2024 the year I pay even more attention to my supplies and materials and I’m hoping to start experimenting with making my own botanical inks and pigments.

Hi! I’m Ali and I’m an Illustrator and Surface Designer living in north Northumberland. I thought you might be interested to find out about what I get up to in a day running my small creative business, Coostie Illustration and Design.

I’m so excited to finally be able to talk about a project I’ve been working on for the charity Equal Arts to illustrate two singing Christmas cards developed and performed by a group at Grange Lea care home and Birch Grove assisted living in Tyneside.

I really love giving people presents - both bought and handmade. In fact, I used to spend hours and hours on Christmas boxes for people, trying to create the perfect mix of handmade goodies (usually edible, but sometimes sewn or knitted) and little things I’d bought over a period of months. By gifting in this way, I could also be 100% sure of what something was made from and it also meant that I could reduce the environmental impact of the gifts themselves, as well as the wrapping and packing. A couple of big life events have made spending that much time on Christmas gifting unfeasible over the last few years. So I thought I’d share some of the things I’ve been doing more recently to try to ensure that my Christmas gifting continues to be as eco-friendly and sustainable as possible.

I really enjoy the run up to Christmas, as I’m a natural list-maker and organiser. I love getting cosy at home with the wood burner on and the smells of Christmas baking and cooking, or venturing out into town or to local events with twinkling lights and good company.

Old trees always seem eternal, like sentinels to history that stand in the landscape. It can be awe-inspiring to stand beneath the canopy of a tree that is hundreds of years old and consider who planted it and how different the world was then.

I love to illustrate simple steps that people can take to live a more environmentally-friendly and sustainable life and incorporate this into my repeat pattern design.

I don’t just draw pretty pictures… I offer a range of services, from freelance illustration and graphic design, to custom illustrated maps and even brand and communications consultancy.

Did you know that that infamous breakfast dish - the kipper - is a smoked herring? But why did I choose a herring as the inspiration for my latest artwork?

When it comes to learning new things, do you prefer to develop your skills using books, or by taking a class?

Why have 1 word of the year, when you can have 2?!

Now all that’s left is to somehow turn this into a career…