West Coast Art and Craft Retreat

West Coast Art and Craft Retreat West Coast Creative Studio is a proudly West Coast supplier of Arts & Craft materials with a combination of original & personalised gifts.

Offering weekly classes where you can find new inspiration and skills with our talented artists.

I do love a good redo once in a while — especially when something destined to be forgotten gets a second chance. 😄With a...
05/09/2026

I do love a good redo once in a while — especially when something destined to be forgotten gets a second chance. 😄

With a little help from Granny B Chalk Paint, a stencil, some gold beads and the usual “I have an idea…” moment, this thrift-shop lamp got a whole new personality.

🎨 Granny B colours used:
Olive Charm & Daisy

A little paint, a little bling and suddenly she thinks she belongs in a fancy coastal boutique. 😂✨

Thrifted. Tweaked. Tarted up. And now proudly living in the lounge. ❤️

Spent the day painting these 3 giant wooden  boxes to hold art supplies.One for my paintone for paint penslast one for b...
30/08/2026

Spent the day painting these 3 giant wooden boxes to hold art supplies.
One for my paint
one for paint pens
last one for brushes.
They are going to be stacked ,so easy to grab when needed.
And of course I had to use geese as inspiration .😆

Since the 6th of June, I’ve been learning a rather unexpected new artistic skill — creating with one hand. 🎨You really d...
27/08/2026

Since the 6th of June, I’ve been learning a rather unexpected new artistic skill — creating with one hand. 🎨

You really don’t appreciate the luxury of having two working hands until one suddenly decides to go on extended leave. 🙄😂

It’s been a difficult and frustrating journey, and everything takes longer than it used to. But apparently the creative part of my brain didn’t get the memo to stop.

So, after much one-handed painting, fiddling, muttering and probably a few words unsuitable for an art gallery… she is finally finished. 💙

“Whispers of Serenity”
Acrylic and mixed media on canvas.

Perhaps rather appropriately, something calm and peaceful emerged from a decidedly un-serene few months.

Proof that even when life ties one hand behind your back — quite literally in my case — you can still create something beautiful. 💙✨

RLN Artworks

Meet latest acrylic play with colors and patterns.Name:Vibrant stripes
26/08/2026

Meet latest acrylic play with colors and patterns.
Name:Vibrant stripes

Grannyb Paint-a-pot-challengeThe mission: turn a mismatched collection of concrete pots and  balls into an aged, weather...
25/08/2026

Grannyb Paint-a-pot-challenge

The mission: turn a mismatched collection of concrete pots and balls into an aged, weathered coastal garden focal point.

The colours used were:

🤍 Buttermilk— my main base
🌼 Daisy — softly dry-brushed and sponged on for those chalky, sun-bleached highlights
🩶 Leroi — layered in to create the aged concrete effect
💙 Midnight Blue — used very sparingly and watered down to create depth, shadow and that slightly battered-by-the-West-Coast-weather look
Protected with Armour.

Nothing was painted perfectly — that was the whole point!

Paint was brushed, dabbed, sponged, wiped off, layered again and generally abused until the pots looked as though they’d spent years quietly ageing beside the sea. 😂

Even the concrete balls were given the same treatment so that everything tied together.

Then came the plants, a bit of bark, solar lights and warm lighting around the pergola — and suddenly my collection of odds and ends became one big coastal installation.

By day it’s all soft chalky whites, greys and blue-grey tones.

By night the warm lights completely change it, picking up every uneven layer and texture in the paint.

And that is exactly what I love about Granny B Chalk Paint — you don’t always have to replace something.

Sometimes it just needs four colours, a sponge, absolutely no respect for perfection… and a little imagination. 😂🎨


Today at the studio, our students entered the highly competitive world of miniature coastal real estate.No building plan...
23/08/2026

Today at the studio, our students entered the highly competitive world of miniature coastal real estate.

No building plans.
No council approval.
No engineers.
Just paint, glue, tiny staircases and an alarming amount of confidence. 🤣

We now proudly present our latest property portfolio:

🏡 Seaside Manor — respectable, coastal and clearly owned by someone who serves w**e before noon.

🌸 The pastel “To Let” — adorable, slightly eccentric and apparently already looking for tenants. References required. No pets… unless they’re tiny.

🌿 Twiggy Towers — where the garden has staged a hostile takeover of the building. Gardening services have officially surrendered.

🌅 The House of the Rising Sun — dramatic, sophisticated and definitely has its own theme song.

🌺 The purple beauty — dark, mysterious and covered in flowers. The sort of house where you visit for tea and somehow stay until midnight.

Same basic little house.

Five students.

Five completely different personalities.

And THAT is exactly why I love teaching art. ❤️

Give creative people the same object and you’ll never get the same result twice.

Finished my abstract in acrylic last night .Visual harmony
22/08/2026

Finished my abstract in acrylic last night .
Visual harmony

WHEN THE OCEAN DECIDES TO DECORATE YOUR GARDEN… 🌊🐟Living beside the sea means never quite knowing what the ocean is goin...
22/08/2026

WHEN THE OCEAN DECIDES TO DECORATE YOUR GARDEN… 🌊🐟

Living beside the sea means never quite knowing what the ocean is going to deliver next.

Over the years we’ve received some very strange gifts, but this enormous old piece of shipwreck timber has to be one of my favourites.

It washed up on the beach directly in front of the house and was so big and heavy that it took two men to drag it out. The old bolts are still embedded in the timber, and judging by its condition, it must have spent a very, very long time underwater getting the ultimate sea-salt treatment.

So naturally, instead of throwing it away, we planted it 70 cm into the ground and decided the garden needed a little fishy Feng Shui. 😂

Many hours of painting later… the school has arrived. 🐟🐟🐟

We suspect the timber may be old Rhodesian teak, although its real history remains a mystery. Whatever ship it once belonged to and wherever it travelled, this particular piece has officially retired to the West Coast.

And right beside the boardwalk, the clivias have decided spring can’t come quickly enough and are already bursting into brilliant orange flowers. 🧡

Another slightly eccentric gift from the Atlantic — this one is definitely staying.

From shipwreck to garden art. Not a bad retirement. 🌊🎨🐟

Meet the latest two ladies to wander out of my sketchbook.One has coffee, flowers and the unmistakable expression of a w...
22/08/2026

Meet the latest two ladies to wander out of my sketchbook.

One has coffee, flowers and the unmistakable expression of a woman who has already heard enough nonsense for one day. ☕😏

The other has fabulous hair, fabulous flowers and is staring dramatically into the distance as though someone has just informed her that w**e is no longer available. 🌸😂

Perfect proportions? Absolutely not.

Normal-sized eyes? We don’t do those here.

Long necks, rosy cheeks, wonky perspectives and enough attitude to require their own postcode? Absolutely. 🤣

Apparently this little adventure of mine falls somewhere around Contemporary Neo-Naïve Figurative Art — which sounds wonderfully sophisticated for “I picked up a pen and gave these women personalities.” 😂

I think they may be the beginning of a series…

RLN Artworks 🎨

Address

11th Street
Saint Helena Bay
7282

Opening Hours

Monday 09:00 - 16:00
Tuesday 09:00 - 16:00
Wednesday 09:00 - 16:00
Thursday 09:00 - 16:30
Friday 09:00 - 13:30

Telephone

+27829296437

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