Bodoni Variations Fall '25 Wed PM

🎄BODODNI VARIATIONS: 8-Week LIVE Online Course via Google Meet

8 Sessions | All Levels | $240 | Wed PM | 6-8:30PM | Oct 1-Nov 19 2025

Make your own variations of Bodoni, with watercolor pencils, whose girth and grace compliment Open-Shaded Script beautifully! Also, MORE FLOWERS and wintery holiday-themed notes and cards!

💻 Classes are recorded and available for download within two weeks after last class date.

Week 1 - Wed Oct 01, 2025 6-8.30 PM Eastern

Week 2 - Wed Oct 08, 2025 6-8.30 PM Eastern

Week 3 - Wed Oct 15, 2025 6-8.30 PM Eastern

Week 4 - Wed Oct 22, 2025 6-8.30 PM Eastern

Week 5 - Wed Oct 29, 2025 6-8.30 PM Eastern

Week 6 - Wed Nov 05, 2025 6-8.30 PM Eastern

Week 7 - Wed Nov 12, 2025 6-8.30 PM Eastern

Week 8 - Wed Nov 19, 2025 6-8.30 PM Eastern

After you register and before the class begins, you will receive a welcome email containing:

• Link to our online classroom folder where you can find uploads each week and a PDF link to exemplar packet to download and print out for our first class.

• The Google Meet Classroom link we will use every week.

After each live class, I’ll upload either a full-length recording of my demonstrations during the class OR a 20-minute review of the pages we worked on (and snapshots of those pages) for you to later download or stream at your convenience. This makes it easier for students to keep up with the class if you cannot participate live.

FLORA2 is an extention of FLORA. What makes it different is the addition of the beautifully dramatic type face BODONI. It’s got all the thicks and thins of calligraphic hands like

Open-Shaded Script, that we love.

Drawing variations of Bodoni is like drawing dessert cakes on a pretty lace doily. They are chunky and fleshy, yet their hairlines are soooooo delicate.

Everything you loved about FLORA, you’ll love about this class. We’ll be studying more florals and flourishes to keep it interesting.

Below is the supply list and information you might be familiar with having taken FLORA before. But if this is your first time, then enjoy!

Much love,

~Anne

Welcome to FLORA with Anne Elser!

“In every walk with nature, one receives far more than he seeks.“ -John Muir

“You do not have to be good.

You do not have to walk on your knees

for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.

You only have to let the soft animal of your body

love what it loves.

Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.

Meanwhile the world goes on.

Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain

are moving across the landscapes,

over the prairies and the deep trees,

the mountains and the rivers.

Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,

are heading home again.

Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,

the world offers itself to your imagination,

calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting –

over and over announcing your place

in the family of things.” - Wild Geese by Mary Oliver

Flora was born on the heels of my course “Love, Fear, and Flourishing” after a solid year of working with students from all over, who saw (many of them for the first time) the freedom an oval provides when harnessing the power of the flourish and how it relates to our lettering.

Flora is also a direct extension of “Mono Linear Lettering: Cursive Crush & Open-Shaded Script” in that we move closer to painting with the aid of a mono line celebrated with a watercolor PENCIL and awakened gently with a fine pointed brush. This two-step process is as pleasurable as it is fascinating and it is my deepest desire that you discover more of yourself in the gentle forms of curving leaves, folding petals, and sweeping stems, all along the oval paths of your letter forms and flourishes.

FLORA is a feminine personification of the healing powers of nature, and draws upon the texture florae make available when looking for a way to fill out and make more dense, our work. FLORA is first drawn with our oldest friend, the pencil - that pressure-sensitive, soft, blunt stick we are all more familiar with than most - the tool we held as toddlers that made our first marks on paper - the beloved crayon, pencil, or colored pencil.

The watercolor pencil’s unique gift is that it can be awakened with water, and not only that, but it can change when that water carries with it another pigment. We will use soft oval-shaped curves to describe absolutely every space-filling element on the page and with every stroke, you’ll find yourself allowing, as Mary Oliver so eloquently states, “the soft animal of your body (to) love what it loves.”

This is my prayer and goal in teaching FLORA. I am sharing with you, my personal mode of self care and healing. FLORA is what I do each and every morning as I sit by the fire to journal. I use her to process my thoughts, to welcome the day, to asks for grace, and to find the silver lining in everything that crosses my path. She is a gentle way for me to try on larger, braver strokes. She’s soft, adaptable, and portable. FLORA requires paper, a small brush, pencil, one cake of watercolor, a small amount of water, and my newest friend: you.

SUPPLY LIST

SAM FLAX is the best local spot to purchase supplies for this class. Anything that you canít find there, can be purchased online at amazon.com, John Neal Books (johnnealbooks.com) or Paper and Ink Arts (paperinkarts.com).

PAPER----------------------------

Get at least one of these and if youíre feeling frisky, all.

Any Hot Press (smooth) watercolor paper will perform very well. Below are brands Iíve used and liked. Youíll want to have at least ten 8.5 x 11 sheets of any of these. If you already have a watercolor paper you love or have, please donít feel obligated to purchase any of the below.

ï Arches or Fabriano Artistico 140 lb Hot Press Watercolor Paper cut down to 8.5 x 11 or smaller.

ï Craneís Lettra by Crane & Co. Fine Cotton 100% Rag. 32 lb. Writing in Pearl White. This comes in a 250 sheet ream and is WONDERFUL to draw and paint on, also luxurious to fold into envelopes. However, itís terrible for pointed pen. I buy this from The Paper Mill Store. com

ï Southworth Resume paper. 100% cotton, 32 lb. in white or ivory. This is made by Neenah paper and is sold in reams of 100. Office Supply stores sell it, as well as Walmart and Amazon. Pointed Pen works well on this stock as well as watercolor, etc. Great for envelopes, too.

PENCILS-------------------------

Watercolor Pencils: I use 3 brands for different purposes. Please note that you DO NOT HAVE TO BUY ALL OF THESE. If you take a look at the swatch samples I have, you can see some colors that are quite similar. One or the other will do just fine. You can also rely on your watercolor palette to provide and change colors you may not have in the pencil versions.

ï Derwent Graphitint Watercolor Pencils: These are soft and creamy neutrals. Get the whole set if you can.

Colors I use most frequently are:

Port (01) Steel Blue (06)

Aubergine (03) Ivy (11)

Autumn Brown (17) Cool Brown (15)

Chestnut (13) Dark Indigo (04) Meadow (10)

Other colors nice to have and that come in the complete full set:

Green Grey (09) Sage (12)

Slate Green (08) Shadow (05)

Ocean Blue (07) Steele Blue (06)

Russet (14) Cocoa (16) Storm (18) Mtn. Grey (21)

Cloud Grey (22) Cool Grey (23)

Juniper (02) Warm Grey (19)

ï Faber-Castell Albrect Durer Watercolor Pencils

These are a harder and waxier pencil that I like because they make crisp, sharp detailed strokes. They keep a finer point and have a really gorgeous selection vivid colors. Refer to the swatches I built so you can choose between colors you find similar. Get the whole set if you can, but below are my recommendations:

Colors I use frequently:

Dark Naples Ochre (184) Light Magenta (119)

Rose Carmine (124) Dark Red (225)

Manganese Violet (160) Burnt Umber (280)

Venetian Red (190) Deep Scarlet Red (219)

Light Phthalo Blue (145) Juniper Green (165)

Chrome Oxide Green Fiery (276)

Raw Umber (180) Pine Green (267) Phthalo Green (161) Cream (102) Dark Cadmium Yellow (108) Walnut Brown (177) Blue Violet (137) Indanthrene Blue (247) Fuchsia (123) Madder (142) Middle Cadmium Red (217) Deep Red (223) Light Cadmium Red (117) Salmon (130) Ivory (103)

Cadmium Yellow Lemon (205) Earth Green (172)

Beige Red (132) PermntGreenOlive (167)

May Green (170)

Olive Green Yellowish (173) Light Red Violet (135) Dark Cadm Orange (115) Rose Carmine (124) Coral (131)

ï Derwent Inktense Watercolor Pencils

These babies are INTENSE, soft, and V I B R A N T. You donít HAVE to buy the whole set, but these are colors Iíve enjoyed using. Again - please refer to the swatches I built so you can choose between colors you find similar.

Spring Green (1550) Felt Green (1530)

Light Olive (1540) Fern (1560)

Leaf Green (1600) Ionian Green (1320)

Violet (800) Mauve (740)

Thistle (720) Fuchsia (700)

Red Violet (610) Carmine Pink (520)

Sicilian Yellow (220) Mustard (1700)

Amber (1710) Tan (1720)

Willow (1900) Sienna Gold (240)

Tangerine (300) Mid Vermillion (310)

Scarlet Pink (320) Poppy Red (400)

Hot Red (410) Chili Red (500)

Cherry (510) Crimson (530)

Shiraz (600) Deep Rose (710)

Dusky Purple (730) Deep Violet (760)

Iron Blue (840) Navy Blue (830)

Iris Blue (900) Dark Aquamarine (1210)

Green Aquamarine (1220) Teal Green (1300)

Iron Green (1310) Field Green (1500)

Hookerís Green (1520) Oak (1730)

Saddle Brown (1740) Baked Earth (1800)

Madder Brown (1920) Neutral Grey (2120)

Ink Black (2200)

PAINT----------------------------

White Ink:

ï Titanium white watercolor or gouache. Put a little dab of this in the corners of your mixing palette to create soft buttery light versions of any of your darker more intense colors.

Watercolor Pan Set: (NOTE - IF YOU ALREADY HAVE ONE YOU LIKE, FEEL FREE TO USE IT INSTEAD OF ANY OF THE BELOW!)

ï Winsor & Newton Professional OR Cotman (student-grade) Watercolors Compact Set with 14 half pans. There IS a price difference between professional ($75) and student grade ($20). Iíve been using the student grade just fine. Iíll upgrade to professional in the near future.

If youíre thirsting for more watercolors, below are some Iíve loved and use. You donít need to get ANY of these, but Iíve listed them in case you want to expand your collection.

ï Iíve recently discovered ShinHan Extra Fine Watercolors. They come in tubes and are SUBLIME and rich - many of them are densely opaque like gouache.

I purchase empty half pans from Amazon that come with little magnets you can stick to the bottom of them before filling - then arrange them any way you like in a metal pan.

Colors I have and love are:

Pyrrole Red (813)

Bright Violet (948)

Umber (973)

Phthalo Blue (RedShade) (924)

Payneís Grey (987)

Cobalt Blue (922)

Purple Grey (946)

Lilac (944(

Brilliant Pink (823)

Jaune Brilliant (866)

Davyís Grey (989)

Turquoise Blue (904)

Jaune Brilliant (865)

Yellow Ochre (970)

Permanent green (875)

Horizon Blue (913)

Green Pale (892)

Cobalt Green (901)

Shell Pink (825)

Another beloved brand is Daniel Smith Extra Fine Watercolors. I donít have very many of these, but I love the ones I have here. The two I use most are Buff Titanium and Duochrome Oceanic.

Quinacridone Burnt Scarlet

Quinacridone Deep Gold

Jadeite Green

Duochrome Oceanic

Buff Titanium

Sap Green

Cobalt Turquoise

Finetec metallic pans are also fab.

Make sure youíve got a warm metallic (like a gold)

and a cool metallic (like a silver.)

The other color besides gold and silver I use frequently is the Blue Pearl - it shifts from a warm silver to an electric blue in different lighting.

Neon Watercolors whether they come in pans or tubes, are (believe it or not) REALLY valuable to have. I like using them as a final touch to quietly layer dabs of the stuff on top of my work. Theyíre transparent and really do add a rich vibration that nothing else can. I find them most successful when used sparingly for a subtle glowing effect.

BRUSH----------------------------

ï Pentel Aquash Water Brush - FINE. This is the cheapest and bestest most fabulous brush I have. I donít fill it with water, just love that itís sharp and snappy, keeps a point and can be protected by itís cap. GET the fine - it works best. And donít rely on other brands to do as good a job. This one really is the best.

MISCELLANEOUS---------------

ï Mechanical pencil to line paper

ï Soft pencil that is dark enough to sketch without creasing paper and can be erased easily. My fave is a Blaclwing 602

ï White eraser

ï Kneaded eraser (I buy 2 and smush them together.)

ï Tombow Mono Sand and Rubber Eraser 510A

ï Ruler

ï Water container

ï Paper towels or towel

ï Washi Tape, bone folder, and postage stamps for envelopes

ï Pencil Sharpener (I have an electric Bostitch but it doesnít easily fit all of my pencils. Many students have expressed satisfaction with these two brands: Quiet Sharp Classroom Electric Pencil Sharpener and X-Acto School Pro or Teacher Pro Electric Pencil Sharpener