About Anna
I wasn't born an artist. I became one, reluctantly.
I studied art at school, then spent twenty years convinced that window had closed. It hadn't.
I studied art all the way through school — A level and everything. And then I stopped. For nearly two decades I told myself the same story: that window had closed. Art was something I used to do, not something I was.
The strange thing about having some formal training is that it can make the gap feel even wider. I knew enough to see how far short I fell. Every time I picked up a pencil as an adult, the inner critic had vocabulary — proportion, tone, line quality — to explain exactly why it wasn't good enough.
I picked up a sketchbook again at 38, after a particularly grey January. I was terrible in a new way — rusty, self-conscious, convinced that whatever I'd once had was gone. But something kept pulling me back. Not talent. Curiosity. A stubborn refusal to accept that the person who'd loved drawing at seventeen was simply gone.
I started teaching locally — small groups in local halls. Mostly people in their fifties, sixties, seventies. Almost all of them said the same thing when they arrived: I haven't done anything like this since school. Some of them hadn't touched a pencil in forty years. Watching them discover that they could — that it was never about talent — changed how I understood what I was actually teaching. Over six years and more than 1,000 student sessions, the method took shape. Not from theory, but from the room.
Teaching is the other half of learning
I'd already seen it in every class I'd taught — the retired teacher who hadn't drawn since school, the grandmother who'd always wanted to but never dared, the person who said 'I'm not creative' as if it were a medical fact. When I started sharing my process online, people wrote back saying the same thing: that's me. I thought I was the only one. The Art Habit Studio Method™ wasn't designed in a classroom. It was built in one — over six years, and more cups of tea than I can count.
See before you draw
Most drawing problems are actually seeing problems. I teach observation as a skill, not a gift.
Habit over inspiration
Waiting to feel inspired is a trap. A small, consistent practice beats occasional bursts of motivation every time.
Process over product
The goal isn't a beautiful drawing. The goal is a mind that knows how to be present, curious, and unafraid.
A little more about me
- A level Art — then nearly two decades away from the page
- 6 years teaching art to adults — over 1,000 student sessions across 15 terms
- Most students arrive not having done art since school — some for forty years or more
- Teaching small groups in local halls
Ready to start your own reluctant practice?
The Blueprint is where most people begin. Four weeks, one small habit at a time.
Get the Blueprint — £29