In August, St Albans Cathedral, in commemoration of the 800th anniversary of the city's role in the story of the Magna Carta, displayed an original document from 1215 as part of a special exhibition explaining the importance of St Albans Abbey in the document's history. 

As part of their celebrations, Paul Wright from the UK's only parchment producer, William Cowley, was demonstrating the ancient skill of preparing parchment for use.  With a wetted goatskin stretched onto a frame, Paul showed everyone how to scrape the lanolin from the skin using a lunar knife, then let us have a go ourselves.  It's a mucky business but the end result is a work of art in itself.

One of the highlights of this year that I'm very much looking forward to is the "Living Letters V : Writing on the Edge" exhibition to be held at Foyles bookshop in London, which will run for almost the whole of October.  The gallery space was offered to the Calligraphy and Lettering Arts society (CLAS) to utilise before the bookshop moves next door in 2014 and so they wasted no time in inviting submissions.

The theme of the  exhibition is Literature and Poetry, which is pretty much the best and broadest subject that any calligrapher can wish for.  The possibilities are infinite!

I am so pleased and excited that one of my own pieces was accepted for inclusion and will hang  alongside some of the most talented calligraphers and Fellows of CLAS.  The evocative words are an extract from "The Stark Monro Letters" by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, and my interpretation is written in pencil and decorated with sumi ink, watercolour and a touch of pastel.

Above is the complete piece entitled "Rain", measuring approx 470 x 200mm, and below, details of the body of lettering and the credit.