Today, I'd like to share my newest piece with you. As usual, I've posted step-by-step photos, so you can see exactly how I painted this plate.

When I started this work, it was spring. Since I wanted to create something seasonal, I decided painting my favorite spring flower, cherry blossoms. I designed lots of tiny flowers in the center of the plate, and added larger ones here and there. At the same time, I wanted to practice some traditional Japanese patterns too, so I created twelve "windows" into the design.

For me, designing is the hardest part. Once I finish it, painting becomes much easier. It almost feels like coloring in a coloring book for children. I put some random colors whatever I wanted to paint on the plate. I used matte paint for the black area.

I designed much simple on the flip side.

Since the first fire didn't look pretty at all, I layered more colors on the window parts, and I also added enamel paint on the larger cherry blossoms to create an emboss effect. Fortunately, it worked, and they looked like embossed.

I did the same thing on the flip side as well.

Once I added more details such as traditional Japanese patterns, all of a sudden, the plate looked stunning! Even so, I felt it needed something extra.

Yes, more gold! I added gold lines on each windows. The gold is as usual 100% Japanese pure gold powder, and the silver part is 100% pure Platinum powder.

The plate is about 10 cm (4 inches) in diameter.

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