This is the Cotinus, as you can see the leaves have a vibrant red colour and a beautiful oval shape. When you’re selecting leaves to plant print with it’s important to consider the size and shape of the leaves. I know these will give really pleasing results.

I use an ancient pan for the boiling. It lives for most of the year in the garden getting rustier and rustier. Added to it is an assortment of iron objects that I’ve also found in the garden including this bit of chain. Don’t forget to exercise caution with this process and work outdoors or in a very well ventilated area.

Here are my papers from this batch drying on old towels in the sun. If they cockle slightly as they dry I’ll press them under a pile of heavy books until they are flat again.

Do you notice the Persicaria leaves there? The shapes of those have come out really nicely defined.

With autumn in full swing here in the Northern hemisphere it seemed the ideal opportunity to do a plant printing session to capture the beauty of the leaves before they fall.

The plant printing technique I use is very straightforward, using paper, water, leaves, iron objects, vinegar and an old pan. If you’ve not tried it yet for yourself, I’d love for you to take a look at our mini course. I’ve linked to it below…

For my plant prints today I decided to just use two different plants – Cotinus and Persicaria. These are two plants that I’ve experimented with before and I know they’ll give excellent results.

And this is the Persicaria. This variety has bi-colour leaves with a fantastic dramatic shape. Although some have that deep purple colour, it seems that the dark purple prints are mainly down to the Cotinus.

Rinsing and opening the paper bundle holds the same excitement as when you hand dye a batch of fabric – you hope you’re going to get good results but you can never be sure!

For this batch of papers one of my aims was to arrange the leaves so as to create borders and frames. I am looking to leave areas of the paper unprinted, or at least relatively plain, so that I have spaces were I can draw or paint later on.

I hope you’ve enjoyed seeing this latest plant printing batch. Don’t forget to check out the workshops if you’d like to give it a go yourself.