Another Six Random Things

It's time for another exciting edition of 'Six Random Things Happening in My Life Right Now' (if anyone has a better name for this, please let me know).

1) This past week my daughter celebrated her first birthday. The day before her birthday she said her first word (it was 'cat'), and took her first steps. It was a great week.

2) My wife just bought a fancy sewing machine (anyone who knows my wife will be surprised by this; she's not always the most domesticated woman). I'm secretly excited about attempting to make my own pants.

3) Once again I'm back in Hong Kong for a couple of weeks for work (my actual work, not this cartooning business. However if anyone wants to fly me across the world for cartooning, be my guest).

4) This week I was one of the millions of Canadians who voted in the national election. The voting station was in an charmingly outdated school gymnasium which reminded me a lot of the elementary school that I went to (shout out to my Graminia School peeps).

5) On the plane to Hong Kong I finally got to watch Jurassic World. The movie itself wasn't that great, but I do love seeing dinosaurs come to life. Fun fact about me: I used to be a designer at a palaeontology museum (shout out to me Royal Tyrrell Museum peeps).

6) I make these iron-rich pancakes for my daughter using baby formula, and they taste even better than regular pancakes. Last time I made them I got distracted and left one on the frying pan for over 10 minutes.

the Buildings of Hong Kong

Today is Hong Kong's National Day, so I thought it would be a great time to finally finish up a project that I started a few months ago.

Inspired by the work of Roger Hargreaves, the Land of Le Beef presents the 'Buildings of Hong Kong'. One thing that fascinated me about Hong Kong when I lived there was forest of great architecture that made up the city. Together they create the shape of the city, but individually they are each contain their stories. This is far from a complete list, but it contains a some of my personal favourites.

If anyone happens to be interested in owning piece of illustrated Hong Kong, prints of this will be available for purchase for a limited time -www.landoflebeef.storenvy.com

Six Things

Introducing a new Land of Le Beef segment: Six Things Happening in My LIfe Right Now

1. This summer my wife and daughter and I moved from Hong Kong to Vancouver. Since being here I have re-established my love of trees and mountains.
2. I have been growing my hair out for the past year or so. I don’t have any plans for how long I’m going to let it grow; I’m just going to enjoy the journey and see where it takes me. Part of me has always wanted long hair.
3. My neighbour offered to lend me his stepladder so that I can install an electric door opener in my garage.
4. Madeline (my daughter) has been getting very close to taking her first steps. She also just learned how to wave, and she loves dancing to funky music. 
5. Most of my electronics don’t fit in Canadian outlets. I might try pounding them in with a hammer. (update: I went to Chinatown and finally found some adaptors. Life is a little bit better now) 
6. I bought a composting bin. It lives at the end of my lawn, and loves it when dump my food scraps in his mouth. We have a good relationship.

woodland murals

if you like beavers and giraffes, and happy smiley vegetables, then this blog post is going to make you happy...

the Land of Le Beef was recently commissioned by Woodland (Hong Kong's top preschool, with 10 great locations throughout the city) to create not one, but two murals at their Waterfall school in Pokfulam.

this of course was a big beefy project (these would be my largest illustrations to date*). i knew that the murals would not only need be super awesome and fun to look at, but also needed to be educational, and inspire the children to do great things with their lives.

i sat down at my desk, pencil in hand, and started drafting what would become the greatest thing since the Sistine Chapel. below are the results.

fruits and vegetables - rough sketch and coloured draft

hippo, mouse, giraffe, beaver - rough sketch and coloured draft

fruits and vegetables - in progress, and finished piece

hippo, mouse, giraffe, beaver - finished piece

*shortly after completing these murals, Woodland invited me back to create an even BIGGER mural at their newest, most awesome location on Caine Road. blog post to come soon...........

Yellow Brick Road

What an exciting week it's been in the Land of Le Beef, with the completion of the first ever Land of Le Beef mural.​ The mural lives at Fill in the Blank, a creative and social workspace in Wan Chai, Hong Kong.

The piece is located on a wall leading to the washroom, and so I wanted to do something that would reflect that, and lead the viewers' eyes in that direction. I also wanted something that would reflect the randomness of the venue (Fill in the Blank is by it's very nature anything that you want it to be - where anyone can show up, and anything can happen), and I thought the Wizard of Oz was a good metaphor of this.

The challenge for me was to recreate the mural in the same style to the rest of the Land of Le Beef family in a completely different size and medium. ​I actually translated as well as I could have hoped. The materials used were pencil, acrylic paint, and oil-based marker. Below is a bit of the process and stages...