Into the Wild by Kelly Blake

Summary
Current Price: £8.99
Number of Pages: 88
Size: 28 x 21cm
Paper colour: White
Paper surface: Smooth 
Paper thickness: Above Average
Linework: Varied​ 
Perforated: No 
One sided: Yes 
Binding: Glue 
Drawings go into the spine: Yes ​
Waterbased pen bleed: None

This is a really different take on a colouring book that requires you to use a pattern system with your colouring palette- but I'll tell you more about that in a moment. Firstly, a bit of background about the book. It was published through a Kickstarter campaign by Bristolian artist Kelly Blake, under her company Dustless Soul Creations. Kelly is a illustration graduate with years of experience in creative arts, and this is her first foray into colouring books.

So, the book! It contains 40 different animals, all pieced together with rugged, ill-fitting shapes that combine to create the finished image. Each shape has its own pattern, whether it be thin diagonal lines or a series of dots, and you have to assign each of these patterns with their own colours. Some of the pictures are recognisable as soon as you look at them, others will be better revealed when coloured.

Each design is one-sided with facts and information about the species on the reverse, and there's also a handy test page at the back of the book to try out your colours before you begin an image. My only gripe is that it is quite difficult to get into the spine as the binding is restrictive, so I found it hard to flatten it out enough to get to the inner side of the image. I'd love a spiral or lay-flat version of this book with easily removable pages, as they'd make brilliant focal points when displayed or framed.

This type of colouring is certainly not something I've come across before- unless you count something like colour by numbers, but this is more 'colour by patterns'. The mosaic style coupled with different people choosing different colours creates a truly unique piece of art at the end :)

Here's my finished picture of a Red Deer, coloured with Staedtler Triplus felt pens.

I was given this book in exchange for an honest review. You can find it on Amazon here:

Into the Wild: Offering you an illustrative and more challenging adult colouring book