Letters from the barn

No. 2 · October 2026

Cornish Craft Barn, Truro

October at the barn — new one-day workshops, the clubs, and the winter diary

A hare, head and ears, in loose warm watercolour washes — by Damian Sémonin

Hare — watercolour, from a demonstration at the barn.

The clubs are up and running — Watercolour on Wednesday mornings, Acrylics & Mixed Media on Tuesdays — and Carla Jennings’ Creative Confidence group are into their three afternoons. This letter is mostly the diary, because October is a busy one: new one-day workshops, a day of water soluble oils with Les Trewin, the Children’s Book Workshop’s autumn series, and the November & December clubs, booking now. And there is still time for the competition — it closes at the end of the month.

In the studio

Art Club — the first cold wax session

The Thursday Art Club round the long table, gloves on, working cold wax into the first mark-making sheets

October at the Thursday Art Club is cold wax medium, and the first session was a full one: everyone round the table preparing their first mark-making sheets — wax and oil worked on, scraped back and built up again, a bank of surfaces to come back to all month.

A misty cold wax landscape in greens and blues, a dark headland across the middle

Mist, a dark headland, and a lot of scraping back.

The first cold wax mark-making sheets taped out on the table, one in deep red

The first sheets, taped out on the table.

The Art Club is members first. If you would like a place, join the waiting list.

Watercolour Club — session one, in full swing

The table mid-session: swatches, mixing palettes and first washes

The Watercolour Club is under way. Session one was about pulling together a watercolour artist’s toolkit — the paints, the palette, the colours worth leaning on — and then exercising our watercolour muscles: swatches, washes, mixing, and the first loose landscapes.

Paint tubes, pans and palettes spread across the table

The toolkit, before anyone started tidying it.

A row of small loose watercolour landscapes in greens and yellows

First loose landscapes, still taped down.

It is not too late to join. Come in on any Wednesday and I will give you a mini induction on your first morning, so you start with the same toolkit as everyone else. Join the Watercolour Club → Last few places.

And the next run starts Wednesday 4 November — six Wednesday mornings, £180.

Coming up

Creative Portraiture — watercolour & mixed media

▶ Watch: Creative Portraiture, from the studio (1½ min)

You don’t need to be able to “draw faces” for this one. A likeness doesn’t live in careful detail — it lives in a few honest relationships: the distance between the eyes, the tilt of the head, the line from the corner of the eye to the corner of the mouth. Get those right and the face is already them. Loose, expressive watercolour, wet-on-wet skin that glows instead of going muddy, and one portrait, start to finish.

Three portraits on the easel: a black and white study, a loose yellow and pink watercolour face, and a blue painted portrait

Monday 12 October, 9.30am–12.45pm — £35, all paints, paper and brushes included, with tea, coffee and cake. Complete beginners through to confident painters.

Creative Portraiture, 12 October — £35

Coming up

Ink & Wash Travel Journalling

A full room last time, and plenty to show for it — line first, then the wash: Cornish mackerel, harbour cottages drawn from photographs, a journal page at a time. The next session is Wednesday 14 October, 1pm–5pm, £35.

“I really enjoyed the class and although there was a lot to get through you managed to compress it into easy steps… Now I know I can just do enough to get started and I don’t need a finished drawing.”
— Roger

“An amazing two hours… I would not have attempted what we did, and am impressed with the results… as was my husband who said ‘I told you you could draw’!”
— Jenny

Cornish Mackerel — a mackerel in ink and blue wash, lettered by hand

Cornish Mackerel, lettered by hand.

A journal page: a cottage and plants in ink and wash

A journal page, from a photograph to the page.

Travel Journalling, 14 October — £35

Artist of the month

September — Julia

September goes to Julia, for a mountain and a lake, painted from her own photograph.

Julia’s thickly painted landscape: a purple and green mountain above a blue lake, dark rocks and grass in the foreground

The paint goes on thick, and every stroke on the mountain follows the slope — so the ridges read as ridges, purple in the shadow and a fresh green where the sun catches the flank. The sky is short, choppy marks; the lake is kept smoother and calmer, which is where your eye comes to rest. Then the near rocks are dark and heavy, and that is what pushes the mountain back into the distance.

Julia’s reference photograph of the mountain and lake

Her reference photograph.

Julia’s painting of the mountain and lake

And the painting.

Julia, your copy of Jerry Saltz’s How To Be An Artist is waiting at the barn.

And for July — Kat

July slipped through between Roger in June and Cindy in August, so it is put right here. July goes to Kat, for an acrylic landscape: a Cornish cove, painted from her own photograph.

Kat’s acrylic of a Cornish cove: turquoise and deep blue water, pale rocks, green headland under a blue sky

Look at what the colour is doing in the water. Over the sand it is turquoise; where the rocks sit under the surface it drops to a deep blue — and that change is the whole sense of depth, with no line drawn anywhere. The rocks are laid in with broken, lighter strokes, so they read as rock rather than as outlines filled in.

Her reference photograph.

And the painting.

A special mention, too, for an earlier piece of Kat’s in ink & wash — Tinners Court, Truro, between Lemon Quay Piazza and Princes Street: line first, then colour, the palm and the yellow building catching the light.

Kat’s ink and wash of Tinners Court in Truro: a yellow building, a palm, tables, handwritten caption

Kat, yours is waiting at the barn too.

New this month

One-day workshops in October

A single session each — come to one, or make a week of it. No club to join and nothing to keep up with.

Tue 13 Oct

9am–12pm

Sunlight & Shadows: Watercolour

£33

places available

Thu 15 Oct

2pm–5.45pm

Acrylics for Beginners - Bold, Fast & Loose!

We will spend a fun-filled half-day immersed in the world of acrylics for beginners…

£35

places available

Mon 19 Oct

9.30am–1pm

Art in Nature: Watercolour

We take the paints outside — capturing light, landscape and the feel of a place in…

£35

places available

Visiting tutor

Les Trewin — water soluble oils

A blue fishing boat, SS748, drawn up on a Cornish harbour slipway — oil by Les Trewin

Oil painting without the solvents. Les teaches a full day at the barn on Friday 16 October and Friday 27 November — £49 for the day. Two places left on 16 October.

Les Trewin, 16 October →

Visiting tutor

Carla Jennings — Mini Botanicals, and Creative Confidence in the New Year

Carla Jennings’ small botanical collages in white box frames

Mini Botanicals — a Tuesday afternoon on 1 December, 1pm–4pm, £39. Three hours of small botanical pieces with Carla, mini in scale, and frames on the day if you want one. A good one to make something for Christmas.

Mini Botanicals — £39

Missed Creative Confidence this autumn? The New Year run is three Tuesday afternoons from 12 January — Mark Making, Colour, Composition — £99 for all three.

Creative Confidence — New Year →

The clubs

November & December — booking now

Both clubs run again after half-term, six weekly mornings each, beginners and improvers together. Plenty of people do both.

Tue 3 Nov

9.30am–12pm

6 dates

Acrylics & Mixed Media Club · Series 1 — November & December

Six Tuesday mornings after half-term.

£180

places available

Wed 4 Nov

9.30am–12pm

6 dates

Watercolour Club · Series 2 — November & December

Six Wednesday mornings after half-term.

£180

places available

The Children’s Book Workshop

From an idea to a book

The autumn series starts on Friday 23 October, 9am–1pm, £160 for the series. And if autumn is too soon, the New Year series starts Friday 15 January.

The Children’s Book Workshop →

Competition

Last call — entries in by the end of October

Adults — a populated beach. Figures at a distance, the busy afternoon, the flags — any medium, any size, one entry each.

Under-12s — animals. Your own, or one you watched this summer. Bring it to the barn or send a photograph.

What’s on

The rest of October

Thu 8 Oct

10am–1pm

4 dates

Thursday Art Club — October block

Thursday mornings at the barn — members first.

Full — join the waiting list

Mon 12 Oct

9.30am–12.45pm

Creative Portraiture: Watercolour & Mixed Media

£35

places available

Tue 13 Oct

9am–12pm

Sunlight & Shadows: Watercolour

£33

places available

Wed 14 Oct

9.30am–12pm

2 dates

Watercolour Club · Series 1 — Autumn

Wednesday mornings to make water do what you meant.

£60

last few places

Wed 14 Oct

1pm–5pm

Ink & Wash Travel Journalling

£35

places available

Thu 15 Oct

2pm–5.45pm

Acrylics for Beginners - Bold, Fast & Loose!

We will spend a fun-filled half-day immersed in the world of acrylics for beginners…

£35

places available

Fri 16 Oct

10am–4pm

An Introduction to Water Soluble Oils — with Les Trewin

Oil painting without the solvents — a full day with guest tutor Les Trewin, making your…

£49

two places left

Mon 19 Oct

9.30am–1pm

Art in Nature: Watercolour

We take the paints outside — capturing light, landscape and the feel of a place in…

£35

places available

Fri 23 Oct

9am–1pm

7 dates

Children’s Book Workshop · Series 5 — Autumn

Five Friday mornings, a fortnight apart, from an idea to work you are proud to show.

£160

places available

November to February

The winter diary is open — and a date at the barn makes a good Christmas present, for someone else or for you.

Tue 3 Nov

9.30am–12pm

6 dates

Acrylics & Mixed Media Club · Series 1 — November & December

Six Tuesday mornings after half-term.

£180

places available

Wed 4 Nov

9.30am–12pm

6 dates

Watercolour Club · Series 2 — November & December

Six Wednesday mornings after half-term.

£180

places available

Thu 5 Nov

10am–1pm

4 dates

Thursday Art Club — November block

Thursday mornings at the barn — members first.

Full — join the waiting list

Fri 27 Nov

10am–4pm

An Introduction to Water Soluble Oils — with Les Trewin

Oil painting without the solvents — a full day with guest tutor Les Trewin, making your…

£49

places available

Tue 1 Dec

1pm–4pm

Mini Botanicals — with Carla Jennings

Three hours of small botanical pieces with Carla Jennings.

£39

places available

Thu 3 Dec

10am–1pm

3 dates

Thursday Art Club — December block

Thursday mornings at the barn — members first.

Full — join the waiting list

Tue 12 Jan

1pm–4pm

3 dates

Creative Confidence with Carla Jennings (3 Workshop Series) — New Year

Three 3-hour workshops — Mark Making, Colour, Composition.

£99

places available

Fri 15 Jan

9am–1pm

5 dates

Children’s Book Workshop · Series 6 — New Year

Four Friday mornings across January and February, a fortnight apart, plus the monthly…

£160

places available

See the full diary →

Damian

Everything is at the Cornish Craft Barn, Kea Downs Road near Truro, unless said otherwise. Tea, coffee and cake are very much part of the day.