After I’ve collected a few hundred images, it’s best to just leap right into the design process and get the worst ideas out of the way….so let’s mix a few images on the bottom of the stole:

The circled segment (Above) is the location for the following designs (Below):

Combine three different stained glass burning bush images, all growing out of a Chinese Lantern seed. NO.

Having it grow out of a water lily leaf does not improve it. Move along, Diane

Let’s find some different trees….

If I take the flames from that first stained glass and remove the black outlines, and use a green tree outline…..NO. That stained glass flame will not work. Drop it.

So let’s spend a few days obsessing over this one instead. (Above).

While I was  photoshopping this poor tree to death, I started thinking that an over-all spiral pattern might be a way of anchoring the design elements (Below): 

(Above)This may work: use a spiral shape, with rainbow colors, as a background anchor, with a swirl of flame forming a counter-balancing spiral at the bottom. The trick will be to have the colors be muted enough so they don’t scream “RAINBOW!” but still giving the piece color.

This part was great fun: I searched through all my old travel images looking for erosion and decay. Worn stones from Australia, that weathered wood from Japan; the carved stone graves from Sicily  and erosion patterns from….Nova Scotia? The brick walls in Tasmania wear very badly due to the salt in the clay used to make the bricks. Plus others found online. Then I gently painted them at 50% or 75% over the spiral colors.

This swirly wear pattern (Above, #1) was found on a wall in Sicily (used in the green section). The trees growing right into the stone wall  (Above, #2) are from Ireland (used at the very top).

OK, I think this basically works.  There will still be many, many changes, but the fundamental design is set. Contact me at dianesavona@aol.com