THE definitive guide to this year’s Swindon Open Studios is now available, hot off the presses.

Featuring an eye-catching image of artist Lynette Thomas’s mosaic of a Wiltshire White Horse on the cover, the guides to this year’s trail are now being distributed around the town ahead of the event getting under way at the beginning of next month.

Each of the 43 artists and groups taking part are featured in the A2-sized fold-out guide, along with a map showing where each of the artists can be found during the two-weekend trail at the beginning of September.

This year’s event features artists from right across the borough with a large number of the artists within easy walking distance of each other in the town centre, while artists further out of town are also eagerly opening up their studios to visitors.

Furthest east this year is Sharon Rich at Henleaze Farm near Fernham, while to the west is Lynne Forrester, who will be exhibiting her work in Bradenstoke Village Hall.

At the northern reaches of the trail is James Osborn in Highworth, while Stephen Lewis Gilmore marks the southernmost point of the trail with his studio on Summerhouse Road in Wroughton.

The guide, designed by Mark Pepperall of Hot Pepper Design, can be easily spotted due to colourful mosaic adorning its cover, which was created for last year’s SOS event by Old Town artist Lynette Thomas. She will be exhibiting her striking mosaics at the Beehive on Prospect Hill.

When The Adver caught up with her on Friday afternoon she was already hard at work putting the finishing touches to the pieces she will be exhibiting this year, which may have led to her phone being covered in grout.

“I was really quite surprised to see the mosaic on the cover,” she said.

“But really quite chuffed at the same time. This year I am working on a project called Aspects of Colour which will be looking at many different interpretations of colour, such as how insects see colour.”

Initially trained as an illustrator, after studying at Swindon Art College she felt it wasn’t the right path for her.

“I just didn’t want to go into illustration,” she said.

“I just came across mosaic by accident really, but it was something I really gelled with and have been trying to progress with that medium ever since. I am a bit of a collector, which is just perfect for mosaic and works really well.”

For more details on Lynette’s work visit www.artkoremosaics.co.uk

Copies of this year’s guide can be picked up from the Swindon Advertiser’s offices on Victoria Road, or on the opposite side of the road in the Post Office. Copies can also be found nearby in the Museum and Art Gallery, the Beehive on Prospec The Hop Inn on Devizes Road, Earle's newsagents on Newport Street, the Central Library or in the recycling bins at 52 St Margaret's Road.