This four and a half hour workshop consists of 2 parts: a 2.5 hour live workshop and TWO hours of pre-recorded video (includes an EXTRA hour of pre-recorded content)
The live part of this class will take place on Saturday 29th August 2026, beginning at 6.30pm UK time & continue to 9pm. There will be a 20-30 minute break around 7.45 pm. These 2.5 hours will be focussed on teaching you how to draw seasonal plants.
During the 2.5 hour live part of the class you will learn the following:
How to break down the complex forms of plants and their flowers into a series of simple shapes.
How to use that technique to drawing a simple botanical specimen
How to apply this technique to flowers and plant forms that are more complex
How to use 2 simple techniques to add shading, giving depth to your illustrations
Tips for collating your illustrations into a botanical diary and I'll demonstrate examples to inspire your future illustration projects
The hour long pre-recorded video will focus on:-
The mental health benefits of combining contact with nature and creative activity
How a period of drawing or indeed any craft alters brain biochemistry and how this is enhanced if you draw regularly
How drawing moves the brain into the flow state and how that is the equivalent to taking more than one medication for your mental health.
I'll also explain how several brief drawing sessions per week of of just 10 minutes or so can decrease your anxiety and improve your mood.
PLUS
An hour long video on neuroscience-backed ways to improve your mental health when you are feeling really low. As a molecular cell biologist who has has struggled with my mental health since I was a young adult I constantly research and implement simple scientifically proven simple behaviours/activities that alter brain biochemistry resulting in lowered anxiety and lifted mood. I will share these in this video which will be uploaded the weekend of 29 August.
This is a workshop suitable for complete beginners. I've taught creative workshops on BBC Countryfile, at the Victoria and Albert Museum and at Highgrove.
By enrolling on this course you'll get an exclusive 10% off pens and sketch books from the stunning independent London stationery shop PRESENT AND CORRECT.
Before the course: I'll message you with recommendations for drawing materials and for plants to look out for on walks, on waste ground or in your garden that are perfect for this workshop.
Emma Mitchell is a Sunday Times best-selling author, mental health advocate, naturalist, professional illustrator and designer-maker. She studied Natural Sciences at Cambridge, spent time in academia studying molecular cell biology and was an technology consultant in emerging technologies in Silicon Fen until 2008, when her struggles with depression and anxiety led her to begin writing about the positive impact of both nature and time spent creatively on mental health.
Emma has written and presented films for BBC Autumnwatch (watch her Autumnwatch film about simple ways to lift your mood in autumn BBC iplayer HERE) and recently appeared on BBC Countryfile (watch Emma explaining how lichens helped create new land at Dungeness, 31 minutes in to the episode HERE), Radio 4's Woman's Hour and Ramblings. She is a Guardian Country Diarist and has contributed pieces on nature and mental health for the Times, Big Issue, inews & Psychologies magazine.
Workshops
Emma has been teaching creative workshops with a focus on mental health for more than a decade. She taught Anita Rani to cast yarrow in silver on BBC Countryfile and has taught classes at the Victoria & Albert museum, The Bronte Parsonage Museum, Cambridge University Botanic Gardens and Highgrove.
In Emma's classes students learn the techniques needed to make and draw beautiful things, but crucially she combines this with teaching the science that explains why and how spending time creatively can shift brain biochemistry to improve mental health.
