Kathryn Holeman's Blog: Colouring Tudor History, page 3

Inside the Book: Tudor Floral Patterns

Our 13th illustration in Colouring History: Tudor Queens and Consorts features a stunning Tudor-inspired floral pattern. These flowers are based on embroidery work which dates back to sixteenth- and seventeenth-century Europe.

For this piece, I began with a measured approach to creating a continuous pattern. I then traced my rough pen drawing and scanned it into Photoshop, copying and pasting to create a seamless horizontal drawing, stacked in an interlocking vertical pattern.

Inside the book: Henry VIII Processing to Parliament in 1512

Our 12th illustration from Tudor Queens and Consorts was a fun challenge to interpret. There are many fascinating aspects to the original vellum roll depicting Henry VIII processing to parliament on February 4, 1512. However, because I wanted my drawing to fill the page of the book, I needed to pull out some of the most important pieces from the original (and very horizontal) illustration. While planning this page, Natalie and I had some funny conversations, including my asking if the acolyt...

Inside the Book: Margaret Tudor at Prayer

As we make our way chronologically through the Tudor dynasty, Margaret is featured as our 11th illustration in Tudor Queens and Consorts. Margaret Tudor, Queen of Scots by her marriage to James IV of Scotland, was the daughter of King Henry VII and Elizabeth of York. This illustration is inspired by a miniature found in an illuminated prayer book dating from c. 1503.

Margaret Tudor’s marriage to James IV in 1503 linked the royal houses of England and Scotland. When her husband died in 1513,...

Inside the Book: Presentation Page from the Vaux Passional

For our 10th illustration in Tudor Queens and Consorts, I’ve created new watercolor video with a few more details about my process for coloring these pages with my favorite media. While the paper isn’t meant for heavy loads of water, light and layered washes of color with the addition of other media like color pencil are a nice way to fill the page. I used some binder clips to keep the page flat while I worked. You can watch the video by clicking to Vimeo here or clicking the photo above....

Inside the Book: Dragons and Flowers

The 9th illustration in Tudor Queens and Consorts is a fun escape into the medieval fantasy world of beasts and dragons. This drawing is based on a page from Petrus Carmeliano’s Suasoria laeticiae, a court poem that celebrates the birth of Prince Arthur Tudor and the end of the civil war. The finished drawing in our book highlights the botanical drawings and quite closely depicts the one dragon we see in the original. The two other dragons are from my own imagination! I’ve included one of m...

Inside the Book: Sudbury Hutch

The coloured drawing from the book, Colouring History: Tudor Queens and Consorts.

This next illustration in Tudor Queens and Consorts features Henry VII and Elizabeth of York, based on carved reliefs found in a preserved cupboard known as the “Sudbury Hutch.” The original hutch is on display in the chapel of St James’ Church in Louth, Lincolnshire. It was a gift from the vicar, Thomas Sudbury, circa 1500. Portrait cabinets such as these continued in popularity throughout the time of Henry VI...

Inside the Book: Portrait of Elizabeth of York

Photo credit: Photo credit: National Portrait Gallery, London. Click the image to read more.

Our next page to colour to Tudor Queens and Consorts is inspired by this late sixteenth-century portrait of Elizabeth of York.

There are a few different versions of this portrait, one of which I spotted at Hampton Court Palace, but the pose and the famous white rose of York are similar across each.

I saved one of the rough sketches of this page to show you my starting stage for making a colouring...

Inside the Book: The Family of Henry VII and Elizabeth of York

This 6th illustration from Colouring History: Tudor Queens and Consorts showcases the family of Henry VII and Elizabeth of York. The original inspiration comes from the illuminated manuscript, ‘The Ordinances of the Confraternity of the Immaculate Conception’, dating from March 1503.

In this image, we see the family of Henry VII with Joachim of Nazareth and Saint Anne meeting at the Golden Gate. The Golden Legend was widely read in late medieval Europe and this meeting was a popular story f...

The Family of Henry VII and Elizabeth of York

This 6th illustration from Colouring History: Tudor Queens and Consorts showcases the family of Henry VII and Elizabeth of York. The original inspiration comes from the illuminated manuscript, ‘The Ordinances of the Confraternity of the Immaculate Conception’, dating from March 1503.

In this image, we see the family of Henry VII with Joachim of Nazareth and Saint Anne meeting at the Golden Gate. The Golden Legend was widely read in late medieval Europe and this meeting was a popular story f...

Inside the Book: The Marriage of Edward IV and Elizabeth Woodville

The Marriage of Edward IV and Elizabeth Woodville.

For our next look at the pages in Tudor Queens and Consorts, I’m skipping the 3rd illustration (which is a lovely pattern) and instead moving on to a more historically dynamic piece. The book is laid out in chronological order so now we find ourselves witnessing the marriage of Elizabeth Woodville and Edward IV. The original inspiration comes from this page in a late 15th c. book by Jean de Wavrin called Chronicles d’Angleterre.

As with eac...