Wine and Art, A Great Day Out

The weather was superb, the vines are starting to flower setting up bud bloom for this years crop of grapes and our budding artists were poised and waiting.

Meeting at the wonderful award winning Carr Taylor vineyard in the heart of glorious East Sussex this multi-day experience consisted of a half day vineyard tour, tutored wine tasting and lunch. The afternoon was spent with professional artists Katie Sollohub. The eager beavers were mum and two daughters as well as English Vine Tour Director Georgie Furst and able water carrier and all round gofer Ben.

The vines are in full swing now with excellent growth and flower bust, forming the buds for this years harvest and future wine for us all to enjoy. Dave, our tour guide was excellent as usual and entertained us with his knowledge and wit. On sampling was Carr taylor's dry white 1066, Alexis dry, dry Rose, sparkling Brut, Sparkling Rose. All were excellent and offer great value for money. Next up were the fruit wines, enjoyed over ice, with the sparkling wines or even still wines.

After lunch our resident artist, Katie Sollohub took command of the group. Introducing the tutorial and discussing with all about various artists, styles, materials and themes. Talking the group through colour, style, method, material the art flowed like wine! Colour was everywhere as were multi-coloured hands, giggles, laughter and a whole lot of artistic fun. Each student had to use a variety of at least 3 different types of brushes and three different types of paint/colour medium. Using large white paper on boards, swapping ideas off each other the afternoon was thoroughly enjoyed by all.

A very special thanks to Katie, Roopa and her family, Georgie and Carr Taylor for making this such a unique and enjoyable day!

We plan to organise more tours of this sort including digital photography workshops. Also check out Georgie's blog for the process behind the workshop.