I am delighted to be commissioned by The Woodlands Trust Scotland to help draw attention to an oak tree in Glasgow’s Kelvingrove Park to help it win European Tree of the Year.

The oak tree was planted in 1918 as a tribute to the women’s suffragette movement and has now been named Scottish Tree of the Year and, with the help of the public vote, is hoping to win European Tree of the Year.  The Suffragette Oak will compete against 14 countries to decide the 2016 European Tree of the Year.  You can vote here to help it win here 

To start this commission I did a site visit to take some measurements and collected some fallen oak leaves to draw.  I wanted to tap into the suffragette link to the tree so used the suffragette colours of purple, green and white to dress the tree in giant rosettes and bunting. I loved hand painting and stencilling each of the bunting pieces as each one is unique and double sided.  I used felt to give the bold colour and layered with acetates the illustrated imagery – Vote for the Oak slogans, oak leaf pattern with a scottish twist of  tartan and i did manage to sneak a few stripe in their too!

My followers will know I love the great outdoors and I’m fascinated with trees so The Woodland Trust Scotland is a perfect match for me.

The Woodlands Trust Scotland are please with what I created and it looked great for the press launch.

Quote from Rory Syme from the Woodland Trust Scotland: “We commissioned Louise to add colour and interest to the oak and help the public realise it’s special importance. Her designs met the brief exactly and help to tell the story of this very important tree.”

I hope it wins!  Please vote for it too here