Garden Flags

I’ve been worked out materials to make my own garden flags since the printer for the last ones closed about six years ago. I am so happy to be able to offer these again, and making them myself gives me so much more versatility in size and shape, and a greater selection to offer at quantities that make sense, as well as possible customization.

Two Cats After van Gogh flag

Flags are printed on cotton muslin with a light fabric transfer finished with a “hot peel”, which means I peel the backing off of it within seconds of opening the heat press, leaving minimal plastic coating on the fabric. Because the transfer is intended for light fabric it covers the fabric well and holds the art well, but doesn’t coat the fabric with vinyl the way the opaque transfer does. It leaves a little bit of body but no real stiffness, and never curls from wetness or cold like other fabric transfers.

Garden flag from the back, with light shining through it.

The flags are printed on only one side. Though I can’t print on both sides, you can see the design really well from the back anytime during daylight.

I typically stock all garden flags shown here, though I only print smaller quantities, usually no more than six at a time. If you’d like a quantity of flags, or a custom flag, please send me an email.

Special: Two Garden Flags for $25.00

Maybe you want a gift or it’s hard to choose just one, this special discount applies all the time on all designs of garden flags for $15.00, nature and cats: buy two garden flags for $25.00, use the discount code 25FORTWOGARDENFLAGS. You get a $5.00 discount when you buy two. All tax, shipping and handling are included in that price. Buy one for yourself and one for a friend!

Garden Flag, Birches 1 Autumn Showers

Garden Flag, Birches 1 Autumn Showers is 11″ x 15″, design imprinted on one side of a cotton/bamboo fabric panel with a 1.5″ rod pocket sewn across the top. Bracket is not included.

Garden Flag, Birches 1 Autumn Showers

The flags are printed on only one side. Though I can’t print on both sides, you can see the design really well from the back anytime during daylight.

I typically stock all garden flags, though I only print smaller quantities, usually no more than six at a time. If you’d like a quantity of flags, or a custom flag, please send me an email.

ABOUT THE ARTWORK

Birches 1, Autumn Showers, oil pastel, 24.5 x 18, 1998 © Bernadette E. Kazmarski

The original of this painting was oil pastel, 24.5″ x 18″, on 300 lb. smooth watercolor paper. From the time I met the paper birch in our front yard I have always been attracted to the delicately detailed white bark of birch trees which seemed to emit its own faint light in any season. Here, in the darkness of the woods, the grouping of white trunks looks like a crowd clustered for discussion, decorated by a maple branch.

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Find more Garden Flags in my Handmade Gift Gallery

Read more about Birches 1: Autumn Showers”

Find other gift items with this image.

Other items with the same art or design To find all items on this site with the same art or design, use the search box for the name of the artwork and you'll find all that's available.

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Click here for the Creative Cat Preview E-newsletter, for feline and animal-specific products and information.

Click here for the Art & Merchandise E-newsletter, for landscapes, nature, urban scenes and more.

For art, photos and writing as I develop it, visit my blogs.

See feline art and photos as they happen on The Creative Cat, along with feline news, health, welfare, rescue stories and more.

See daily photos as I post them on Today.

Read poetry, short stories, essays and more on Paths I Have Walked.

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© 2020 | www.PortraitsOfAnimals.net | Published by Bernadette E. Kazmarski

All images used on this site are copyrighted to Bernadette E. Kazmarski unless otherwise noted and may not be used without my written permission. Please ask if you are interested in using one in a print or internet publication. If you are interested in purchasing a print of this image or a product including this image, check to see if I have it available already. If you don’t find it there, visit “purchasing” for availability and terms.

Garden Flag, Birches 2 Radiance

Garden Flag, Birches 2 Radiance is 11″ x 15″, design imprinted on one side of a cotton/bamboo fabric panel with a 1.5″ rod pocket sewn across the top. Bracket is not included.

Garden Flag, Birches 1 Radiance

The flags are printed on only one side. Though I can’t print on both sides, you can see the design really well from the back anytime during daylight.

I typically stock all garden flags, though I only print smaller quantities, usually no more than six at a time. If you’d like a quantity of flags, or a custom flag, please send me an email.

ABOUT THE ARTWORK

Birches 2: Radiance, watercolor, 22 x 23, 1998 © Bernadette E. Kazmarski

The original of this painting was 22 x 23, ink and watercolor. We have lovely birch groves here in Western Pennsylvania, and this image was reminiscent of one I had encountered while walking through the woods somewhere near me. Not just the white bark, but the contrast with the thin dark twigs and ripples in the bark, is eye-catching, and that autumn display of yellow leaves is nearly blinding. Add a few other leaves to the mix and it becomes a classic autumn scene.

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Find more Garden Flags in my Handmade Gift Gallery

© 2020 | www.PortraitsOfAnimals.net | Published by Bernadette E. Kazmarski

Garden Flag, Evening Wildflowers

Garden Flag, Evening Wildflowers is 11″ x 15″, design imprinted on one side of a cotton/bamboo fabric panel with a 1.5″ rod pocket sewn across the top. Bracket is not included.

Garden Flag, Evening Wildflowers

The flags are printed on only one side. Though I can’t print on both sides, you can see the design really well from the back anytime during daylight.

I typically stock all garden flags, though I only print smaller quantities, usually no more than six at a time. If you’d like a quantity of flags, or a custom flag, please send me an email.

ABOUT THE ARTWORK

Evening Wildflowers, pastel, 10 x 14 © Bernadette E. Kazmarski

On a sweltering, sticky August evening I discovered an incredibly beautiful patch of native wildflowers intentionally seeded at Scott Conservancy Kane Woods. I forgot about sweaty hands and the pulse of the sun directly in my face because it was also touching each and every flower on that hillside, filling leaves and petals with brilliance. I photographed my fill.

More like this

Find more Garden Flags in my Handmade Gift Gallery

© 2020 | www.PortraitsOfAnimals.net | Published by Bernadette E. Kazmarski

Garden Flag, Two Cats After van Gogh

Garden Flag, Two Cats After van Gogh is 11″ x 15″, design imprinted on one side of a cotton/bamboo fabric panel with a 1.5″ rod pocket sewn across the top. Bracket is not included.

Garden Flag, Two Cats After van Gogh

The flags are printed on only one side. Though I can’t print on both sides, you can see the design really well from the back anytime during daylight.

I typically stock all garden flags, though I only print smaller quantities, usually no more than six at a time. If you’d like a quantity of flags, or a custom flag, please send me an email.

ABOUT THE ARTWORK

“Two Cats After van Gogh”, oil pastel, 6″ x 5″ © Bernadette E. Kazmarski

I’m so pleased this design won both a Muse Medallion and the President’s Award in the 2013 Cat Writers’ Association communications contest, and it was also one of the main inspirations for pursuing the idea of somehow, some way, printing my art on garden flags.

When I first painted the original painting in this series, “Two Cats After van Gogh”, I posted my impressions and reasons for the style I’d used in oil pastel:

I am channeling Vincent van Gogh tonight, trying to work the same energy and form I see in his brush strokes. I can layer with oil pastel, but can’t apply or build up the thickness of medium that can be accomplished with paint; this sketch is also quite small, about 6″ x 5″, so I can’t work all the little strokes in as I’d like, but perhaps I’ll actually try this on canvas at some point, and something a little bigger.

I traveled with a friend in April 2012 to see the “Van Gogh Up Close” exhibit. Although it seems I love the Impressionists best, van Gogh is a step apart from the Impressionist styles we find most familiar in Monet, Renoir, Degas, Cassatt with his stylized forms and brilliant, often non-representational colors. I’d only seen a few original van Gogh paintings, and taking in an entire exhibit intended to show you van Gogh’s work near enough to touch and to see his influences filled my head with dimensional flower petals, rippling wheat textured in fields, dappled leaves seeming to move with the extra layers of paint—and colors! I closely studied the way he roughly blended colors into one another and what colors he used, the brilliant greens contrasted with the earthy sepia, lots of yellow and blue.

All the way home on the Megabus I remembered the colors and shapes and textures, and wanted to work the same energy and form I saw in his brush strokes, visualizing oil pastel to layer and blend the strokes as an experiment. Arriving home in Pittsburgh just a few hours later I saw Giuseppe and Mr. Sunshine, just quietly hanging together on the landing, Giuseppe sitting upright, Sunshine loafing, and visualized exactly what I would sketch.

Since then, when the pull of the textures and layers and colors draws me in, I’ve worked several other images in oil pastel in similar style. Oil pastel is not a popular medium, and I found it difficult to learn to handle. I’d actually done a few other landscape and still life paintings with them years ago, but put them aside in favor of my chalk pastels in my tiny crowded studio.

And the second one that’s on the other side of this flag, “In Window Light”:

Here Mimi lounges in the light from the window, slipping in under the mini blind. Who doesn’t know that posture of the vigilant kitty, not sleeping, just kind of hanging out and waiting for…well, humans tend to be pretty dull, but that gives kitties a lot of resting time. In the strength of the sun, all colors appear in her fur and on the old marble windowsill and the hot yellow sun outside the window, and I’ve no doubt Mimi enjoyed her nap.

More like this

Find more Garden Flags in my Handmade Gift Gallery

© 2020 | www.PortraitsOfAnimals.net | Published by Bernadette E. Kazmarski

Garden Flag, Out the Front Door

Garden Flag, Out the Front Door is 11″ x 15″, design imprinted on one side of a cotton/bamboo fabric panel with a 1.5″ rod pocket sewn across the top. Bracket is not included.

Garden Flag, Out the Front Door

The flags are printed on only one side. Though I can’t print on both sides, you can see the design really well from the back anytime during daylight.

I typically stock all garden flags, though I only print smaller quantities, usually no more than six at a time. If you’d like a quantity of flags, or a custom flag, please send me an email.

ABOUT THE ARTWORK

“Out the Front Door”, Watercolor, 6″ x 9″ © Bernadette E. Kazmarski

This sketch from Halloween night in 2012 as I handed out my candy and all the knocking got to be a bit much for these four was destined to be a Halloween design. I put together my desktop calendars, but when I designed the card the sketch needed a little something extra so I drew a pumpkin to add to the design.

More like this

Find more Garden Flags in my Handmade Gift Gallery

© 2020 | www.PortraitsOfAnimals.net | Published by Bernadette E. Kazmarski

Garden Flag, Studio Window, Autumn

Garden Flag, Studio Window, Autumn is 11″ x 15″, design imprinted on one side of a cotton/bamboo fabric panel with a 1.5″ rod pocket sewn across the top. Bracket is not included.

Studio Window, Autumn Garden Flag

The flags are printed on only one side. Though I can’t print on both sides, you can see the design really well from the back anytime during daylight.

I typically stock all garden flags, though I only print smaller quantities, usually no more than six at a time. If you’d like a quantity of flags, or a custom flag, please send me an email.

ABOUT THE ARTWORK

“Studio Window, Autumn”, 5.5″ x 8.5″, watercolor © Bernadette E. Kazmarski

I’m so excited to offer an image that is so dear to me—one of my cats on my studio windowsill. All the years I’ve been here I’ve loved my time in my studio, which was also once my foster room. I often remark how my cats enjoy spending time with me in my studio because they sense my own enjoyment of what I’m doing, and for frightened fosters not only can they sense that but I’m also in a typically non-verbal space, something they and all cats find very comfortable. Sharing my non-verbal self with animals, especially cats, has been one of my lifelong joys, and often a great comfort. My memories of cats sharing my studio with my felines, especially seeing them enjoy the view out the window, are very special. So for all those reasons I’m so happy to share this painting for the month of October.

More like this

Find more Garden Flags in my Handmade Gift Gallery

© 2020 | www.PortraitsOfAnimals.net | Published by Bernadette E. Kazmarski

Garden Flag, Happy Meow-lo-ween

Garden Flag, Happy Meow-lo-ween is 11″ x 15″, design imprinted on one side of a cotton/bamboo fabric panel with a 1.5″ rod pocket sewn across the top. Bracket is not included.

Garden Flag, Happy Meow-lo-ween

The flags are printed on only one side. Though I can’t print on both sides, you can see the design really well from the back anytime during daylight.

I typically stock all garden flags, though I only print smaller quantities, usually no more than six at a time. If you’d like a quantity of flags, or a custom flag, please send me an email.

ABOUT THE ARTWORK

Happy Meow-lo-ween desin

I also offer this design as a placemat and a greeting card, and you can find handmade gift items by searching “Halloween“.

More like this

Find more Garden Flags in my Handmade Gift Gallery

© 2020 | www.PortraitsOfAnimals.net | Published by Bernadette E. Kazmarski

Garden Flag, Sophie Keeps an Eye on Things

These “garden flags” are 11″ x 15″, digitally printed on both sides of a heavyweight, durable indoor/outdoor woven printable fabric, and I finish by adding the rod pocket. (Bracket is not included.) Shipping is included.

UPDATE: Only three flags left!

Garden Flag, Sophie Keeps an Eye on Things

Each flag has a design on both sides, in this case it’s the same on both sides, but mirrored. This art is the only one in my set of garden flags that is not a sketch or painting, but a photograph–and a very favorite photograph called “Sophie Keeps an Eye on Things”, taken in 2005. I also offer this image as a greeting card and as a print on paper, canvas and more.

Greeting card or sympathy card

Prints and canvases

ABOUT THE ARTWORK

Sophie could use any prop to dramatic effect, and the lace curtains were her favorite. Of course, you can’t see her. But if you look closely you might see a cat’s face through the lace that might have Sophie’s big green eyes with heavy eye-liner, and her tabby babushka and outlined nose.

I took a number of other photographs the same day I took “Sophie Keeps and Eye on Things”, all with the lace curtain filled with early evening sun. I was preparing to leave the house on my bike and had my original little 2MP digital camera, and because Sophie always fussed when I was leaving she got extra attention, inside and out. Never sorry for spending that time!

In the evenings I closed my curtains before I left. Sophie always watched me leave the house and she took the opportunity to play around with the curtains—often I had to inspect the lace to see her white fur through the mesh, or she dramatically appeared from between the panels, around the edge or underneath, but she was always there with her big round eyes.

On this day, in the late afternoon, the warm spring sun angled into the window imparting a creamy tone to the lace, and the forget-me-nots I’d planted in pots in the windowbox were in full flower. Before I left I closed the curtains because I’d be gone after dark, and Sophie began her little game while I was still indoors, so I stopped and captured a few images of her silhouetted and peering through the curtain at me.

Then I finally went out the door and, as I always did, stopped to look back at both my front windows and the door to see which kitties were bidding me farewell, or sending me on a guilt trip, depending on their attitude. I don’t remember who was at the other window or the door, but Sophie managed to find an open spot to peer through the lace at me in several different ways. I had my bike and my hands full of things, and only my little 2MP digital with no zoom, and wished I had my Pentax film camera at least, knowing the shot would be difficult with the tiny digital. I considered stepping back in to get the film camera, but knew she’d move and I’d never see this particular shot again. So I put everything down, kicked out the kickstand on my bike, pulled the digital out of its little wallet, pointed and clicked, several times, and hoped for the best. And I got it.

I lost Sophie at the end of 2006 and hardly a day goes by that I don’t think about her. Her rescue story is also one of the funniest of all my rescue stories, so take time to read “The Housewarming Cat”: http://thecreativecat.net/the-housewarming-cat-2/#.VHmdvsmEzbE.

So in photographing your cats, let that be a lesson to you! Do your best with what you have, and don’t hesitate, just take the photo. If you don’t capture the shot you wanted you may get something else entirely, and you may come up with something fantastic.

Flags are 11” wide x 15” tall and fit the most common garden flag bracket available, sold in most hardware and home renovation stores with a garden area.

My garden flags are designed with images of my feline artwork, from the quick colorful sketches I create each day to my detailed fine art paintings. They are made locally to me and I can work closely with the printer and have smaller quantities made, and therefore offer more designs.

Other items with the same art or design To find all items on this site with the same art or design, use the search box for the name of the artwork and you'll find all that's available.

Don’t miss any new items or opportunities!

“Follow” the Portraits of Animals blog with the link in the upper left. Sign up to receive posts in email, or in your favorite reader using the links in the right-hand column.

Sign up for e-newsletters

You can also sign up for my monthly e-newsletters to receive special discounts and find out where I’ll be with my artwork.

Click here for the Creative Cat Preview E-newsletter, for feline and animal-specific products and information.

Click here for the Art & Merchandise E-newsletter, for landscapes, nature, urban scenes and more.

For art, photos and writing as I develop it, visit my blogs.

See feline art and photos as they happen on The Creative Cat, along with feline news, health, welfare, rescue stories and more.

See daily photos as I post them on Today.

Read poetry, short stories, essays and more on Paths I Have Walked.

. . . . . . .

Garden Flag, Garden Sketch with Mimi

Garden Flag, Garden Sketch with Mimi is 11″ x 15″, design imprinted on one side of a cotton/bamboo fabric panel with a 1.5″ rod pocket sewn across the top. Bracket is not included.

Garden Flag, Garden Sketch With Mimi

The flags are printed on only one side. Though I can’t print on both sides, you can see the design really well from the back anytime during daylight.

I typically stock all garden flags, though I only print smaller quantities, usually no more than six at a time. If you’d like a quantity of flags, or a custom flag, please send me an email.

ABOUT THE ARTWORK

"Garden Sketch With Mimi", 5" x 7", watercolor, 2013 © Bernadette E. Kazmarski

This was not what I’d intended but I like it anyway. It’s Mimi napping in the shadow on the cool bricks among the geraniums, near the vintage aluminum tub where I grow pole beans. Mimi was so happy to be outside she only rested in each position for less than a minute, and the sun was in and out behind the clouds. The temperature was in the 90s and we weren’t doing much but looking for a comfortable spot.

I had wanted something a little tighter in detail, but I like the details this one has. I did a light pencil sketch underneath because it’s so small I knew I’d run out of space if I didn’t give myself some guidance about Mimi, the geraniums and the barrel, but aside from that I just painted.

In part I was using the quick and easy eight-color grade-school set that’s easy to carry and use I really need to get a set with a greater color range if I’m going to paint outdoors.

But what was my purpose with this painting? Sometimes I sit down to capture the details of the moment, and some day I’d like to do just that with the reference photos from this, but with my actual sketch, and all my daily sketches, my purpose is just to capture the essence of the moment and share what moved me to render the scene. In this case it was a relaxed Mimi in the shade on a hot morning, stretched on those familiar bricks next to the cool anodized aluminum tub where I’ve always planted pole beans and surrounded by my geraniums saved from year to year. It was a scene I loved for my love of my garden, my appreciation of Mimi relaxing in a place she’d once hunted for food to feed her kittens, and the memory of the generations of cats before her who enjoyed that very spot, this little patio and the verdance of my garden.

Flags are 11” wide x 15” tall and fit the most common garden flag bracket available, sold in most hardware and home renovation stores with a garden area.

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Read more about Garden Sketch with Mimi.

To find other gift items with this image, search Garden Sketch with Mimi.

Find more Garden Flags in my Handmade Gift Gallery

Other items with the same art or design To find all items on this site with the same art or design, use the search box for the name of the artwork and you'll find all that's available.

Don’t miss any new items or opportunities!

“Follow” the Portraits of Animals blog with the link in the upper left. Sign up to receive posts in email, or in your favorite reader using the links in the right-hand column.

Sign up for e-newsletters

You can also sign up for my monthly e-newsletters to receive special discounts and find out where I’ll be with my artwork.

Click here for the Creative Cat Preview E-newsletter, for feline and animal-specific products and information.

Click here for the Art & Merchandise E-newsletter, for landscapes, nature, urban scenes and more.

For art, photos and writing as I develop it, visit my blogs.

See feline art and photos as they happen on The Creative Cat, along with feline news, health, welfare, rescue stories and more.

See daily photos as I post them on Today.

Read poetry, short stories, essays and more on Paths I Have Walked.

. . . . . . .

Return to Handmade Gift Gallery

Other items with the same art or design To find all items on this site with the same art or design, use the search box for the name of the artwork and you'll find all that's available.

Don’t miss any new items or opportunities!

“Follow” the Portraits of Animals blog with the link in the upper left. Sign up to receive posts in email, or in your favorite reader using the links in the right-hand column.

Sign up for e-newsletters

You can also sign up for my monthly e-newsletters to receive special discounts and find out where I’ll be with my artwork.

Click here for the Creative Cat Preview E-newsletter, for feline and animal-specific products and information.

Click here for the Art & Merchandise E-newsletter, for landscapes, nature, urban scenes and more.

For art, photos and writing as I develop it, visit my blogs.

See feline art and photos as they happen on The Creative Cat, along with feline news, health, welfare, rescue stories and more.

See daily photos as I post them on Today.

Read poetry, short stories, essays and more on Paths I Have Walked.

. . . . . . .