The next earth-shaking issue of Ugly Mug, the House of Harley’s anthology of ‘comics to amuse and confuse’, will hit the stores in early Autumn. The original 1980s run of Ugly Mug is long out of print, so why not act now to fill the gaps in your collection of back issues while they’re still available?

Ugly Mug 6 proved that our 21st century return was no one-off, with 100 pages of prime comix-art righteousness created by the krispy kreme of the British small press cartooning scene and a pastry platter of international guests.

Amongst the highlights in this issue are…

• RSD Lang Record Detective – Ed Pinsent‘s intemperate sleuth investigates The Beatles’ White Album

• Sous Chef Blues – the twisted politics of food exposed by Tom Baxter Tiffin

• Viktor Frankenstein Retired – anonymity and seclusion in a seaside town, by John Bagnall

• In Spelunca – Marc Baines reveals the secret lodged in the caves of Whitby

• The Young Prince Umsween – a new take on an old allegory by Chris Reynolds

• I Got Hung on the Wire – Jason Atomic gets tangled up in barbed wire and brambles

• Street scenes and portrait sketches – city living illustrated by Patricia Gaignat

• Sandecay – vast skies, truth and lies documented by Orkney vistor iestyn

• Cardboard cities – radical street plans designed by Jim Barker

• Japanese graphix – four eye-popping drawings by the mysterious Masaman

• Scenes from Club Mancuso – portraits of visitors to the prestigous floating venue, by owner Vince Mancuso

And from the House of Harley studio…

• Seb, Suspended – our heroine’s world goes topsy turvy

• While the City Slumbers – giants walk the land

• PCSO Dan – creates content for the community

• Patricia does not do the dishes – and explains why

• Smoked-Out Shindig – Greek goddess sabotages party

• How to read Ugly Mug – a user’s guide

• Voodoo Master Funnies – you’ll literally laugh your head off

• Hangin’ with the House of Harley – fan questions answered

“A mixture of genius and drivel, just like comics should be. I laughed! I cried! I scratched my head!” 
Roger Sabin, Professor of Popular Culture, Central Saint Martin

Get your copy now – 100 pages for £14.99+postage from our Etsy store. (Readers outside the UK may find it cheaper to order via Lulu).

Or check out the Comics section of our store for other 21st Century issues of Ugly Mug, along with gift bundles, and our innovative Naked Knowledge puzzle-comic (tagline – “you might learn something”).

Ugly Mug 9 is due out this autumn. To sign up for notifications about that or other House of Harley news, look for the ‘Join for Free’ button on this page.

Well maybe it’s not a surprise, but either way the House of Harley Shop is back from its holidays – and to mark the reopening we’ve added a new item to our range of original HoH pen-and-ink pinups.

‘Surprised’ is the name we’ve given this moment that was captured in ink and featured in our limited edition print collection Winning Streak 1. You’re looking at a family-friendly section of the drawing above but grown-ups can see the full image on its Etsy listing.

This one-of-a-kind piece of House of Harley art on a sheet of A4 can be yours for just £25+p&p. First come first served, natch.

And if you like what you see, you can explore our growing collection of pen-and-ink pinups, all available for highly affordable prices.

In the House of Harley shop you’ll also find comics, limited edition art booklets, original pages from Ugly Mug, life drawings, rare recordings by Pestrepeller and Mystery Dick, badges, sketchbooks and much more for sale. Shop until you flop or your wallet says stop!

The hard-working staff of the House of Harley shop are on holiday for a few weeks, but you can still feed your need for top-grade HoH art by joining one of our Patreon clubs.

Our Digital Gallery (£2/month) features regular highlights from the House of Harley sketchbooks, many enhanced with vibrant and imaginative digital colour or fed through our patent abstractifier with delightful results. We also revisit highlights from over 15 years of posts to the House of Harley blog in closer detail. There’s life drawings, fashion illustration, sci-fi, horror, movie posters, urban sketching, fungal footwear, unusual architecture and much more. Along with some occasional tasteful nudity.

Our Digital Boudoir (£4/month) gets you access to all posts in the Digital Gallery plus pin-ups, figure studies, abstract lingerie, and other clothing-lite depictions and imaginations flowing from the House of Harley’s lusty pen. May make a person blush.

Signing up to either club gets you access to almost a year’s worth of content plus new posts arriving in your inbox every few days.

You can also sign up for free to receive news about House of Harley publications, reviews and events.

Or maybe you’d like to Gift a membership to a friend or loved one.

Head over to our Patreon site now and select the right membership tier for you.

More warm-up drawings, this time in pencil, for a canine-themed comic strip that will feature in the next issue of our anthology Ugly Mug, out this autumn. And here’s part 1.

Here’s the pages of drawings… if you’d like to purchase the A4 originals, make us an offer.

You can buy the latest issue of Ugly Mug for £8.95+p&p from our Etsy shop.

Join the free version of our Patreon club to receive notification when Ugly Mug 9 hits the streets – look for a sign up button on this page.

This coming Sunday (19th July) our head honcho Harley R will take part in a panel discussion about Fast Fiction.

Fast Fiction 17 – cover by Glenn Dakin

Fast Fiction was one of the earliest manifestations of small press comics in the UK, active from the early 1980s. It was an anthology comic, a distribution service, and a mail order service. There’s a gallery of Fast Fiction magazine covers on Ed Pinsent’s website (from which the image above is borrowed).

The teenage Harley was a contributor to Fast Fiction magazine and for several years helped Ed Pinsent run the FF stall at the bi-monthly comic marts in Westminster Central Hall which also provided an excuse for talented small pressers to meet and socialise. Here’s a photo of Ed and Harley on the stall sometime in the late ’80s. (The photo may have been taken by cartoonist Bob Lynch).

The panel will attempt to tell the story of Fast Fiction from the people who started it and who made it happen at the time: Ed and Harley will be joined by FF’s founder Paul Gravett and fellow small presser Ed Hillyer.

This will be one of several talks at the South London Comics & Zine Fair, a celebratory day of comics and zines, bringing together fans and creators from across the UK.

SLCZF takes place from 12noon to 6pm on Sunday 19th July at Stanley Arts, 12 South Norwood Hill, London, SE25 6AB. There’s more info on the Stanley Arts website and you can follow the event on Instagram.

The ‘FAST FICTION, Fast Facts’ panel begins at 5pm. Hope to see you there.

Some warm-up drawings for a canine-themed comic strip that will feature in the next issue of our anthology Ugly Mug, out this autumn. Join the free version of our Patreon club to receive notification when Ugly Mug 9 hits the streets – look for a sign up button on this page.

Here’s the page of pen-and-ink drawings… if you’d like to purchase the A4 original, make us an offer.

You can buy the latest issue of Ugly Mug for £8.95+p&p from our Etsy shop.

The House of Harley is delighted to join the list of exhibitors at ARC, London’s new festival of contemporary comics.

ARC showcases some of the best independent comics, graphic novels, sequential art and form-altering visual narrative and features a curated line up of over 100 UK based and international artists and publishers.

We will be selling our comics, books, original art, sketchbooks, badges and more besides. Come along and say hello.

ARC London takes place this Saturday 11th (11am-6pm) and Sunday 12th July (11am-5pm) at Unit 08, Copeland Park, Peckham, London SE15 3SN. FREE ENTRY. The nearest railway station is Peckham Rye.

Follows ARC on Bluesky, Instagram or Facebook.

The next earth-shaking issue of Ugly Mug, the House of Harley’s anthology of ‘comics to amuse and confuse’, will hit the stores in early Autumn. The original 1980s run of Ugly Mug is long out of print, so why not act now to fill the gaps in your collection of our 21st Century editions, before they disappear forever?

Ugly Mug 5 – our triumphant return after a 30-year break was published in the latter days of lockdown, which may explain why our trademark irreverent humour is laced with an undercurrent of paranoid horror.

Readers of a nervous disposition are alerted to this change of tone by the grinning face of the malevolent Voodoo Master on the cover – a sinister example of hypnotic suggestion masquerading as trigger warning!

Amongst the highlights in this issue…

• Organic Matter – an auxiliary brain is assembled, in a twisted tale by Ed Pinsent

• Count Dracula’s Great Secret is revealed, in a tribute to horror movie maverick Paul Naschy, 1970s ice lolly ads and picnic vodka

• Enigmatic cover star Voodoo Master undergoes a mid-life crisis

• Seb, stranded in fog – where is everyone? The first episode of our Anglo-French heroine’s adventures in the unknown

• The Kommuter Kronicle exposes the psycho-political horror of public transport policy

• Harvey’s S-S-S-Secret – Hollywood actor Harvey Keitel faces his biggest fear, in a half-remembered tale by the House of Harley studio

• Father Gilderoy Investigates – meet John Bagnall‘s dynamic sleuth

• Peasholm Island – prologue to the forthcoming graphic novel The Rightful King of the North Riding by Marc Baines

• Discourage the Use of Cash – the House of Harley’s Behavioural Research Unit strikes

• Negative Lad asks what good are superpowers in this misbegotten world?

• Trick or Street – never drive at night!

• Somberline: Dreams of Power – ominous politics abound in this one pager by the much-missed Chris Reynolds

• The Saga of the Scroll – Harry Excess encounters a giant octopus and other evil omens, in chapter 5 of Ed Pinsent‘s Windy Wilberforce epic

  • Note for readers: the individual episodes of our ongoing serials can be enjoyed on their own – no prior knowledge is required!

  

  There’s also eye-popping art by underground cartoon legends Savage Pencil, Denny Derbyshire, Niall Richardson and Tom Baxter Tiffin.

“…an irresistible compendium of non-mainstream comic strip goodness. The contents run the gamut from rational to surreal, silly to sophisticated, amusing to offensive; UGLY MUG 5 is, in short, eminently representative of the state of the art in modern-day underground comix.” – The Bedlam Files

Get your copy now – 72 pages for £9.95+postage from our Etsy store. (Readers outside the UK may find it cheaper to order via Lulu).

Or check out the Comics section of our store for other 21st Century issues of Ugly Mug, along with gift bundles, and our innovative Naked Knowledge puzzle-comic (tagline – “you might learn something”).

Ugly Mug 9 is due out this autumn. To sign up for notifications about that or other House of Harley news, look for the ‘Join for Free’ button on this page.

Get your choc ices ready! Submit your annual leave request to HR! Book a deckchair on your nearest beach! And head over to John Bagnall’s Etsy store to pick up a copy of The Bugle Summer Special, the ideal reading material for this hot hot summer.

The Bugle Summer Special is a tribute to the British comics of yore and has been lovingly put together by cartoonists John Bagnall and Phil Bartle, who have populated the fictional northern English town of Slackdale with characters such as Nervous Nigel, The Boggs, entertainer Bryan Trowell, Harold McHector the Manic Collector, Father Ogle, Misery Guts, sweet shop owner Bobby Minto and the battling brothers Eric and Derek.

This issue also features stories by regular Ugly Mug contributors Ed Pinsent and Marc Baines, along with an all-new House of Harley three pager: the return of Lady Backenforth – she’s the Lord of the Manor – in another battle with the boys and girls of Slackdale…

And it comes with a fantastic FREE gift – Battling Eric and Derek Puppets.

To celebrate the new issue, there’s a launch event this Friday (26th June) at Consett Heart – Heritage & Arts Centre, The Old Ambulance Hall, John Street, Consett, County Durham DH8 5AS. Get yourself along for a night of musical entertainment from The Tunisians, Lee Harrison and One Dollar Zombies.

Original artwork from The Bugle will be on sale, along with comics, postcards and jars of Slackdale pickles! The exhibition opens at 5.30pm and the music begins at 7pm. Entry is free but any donations go to keeping Consett Heart open.

The Bugle Summer Special is available now for £5+postage from John Bagnall’s Etsy store.

The new issue of Bagnall and Bartle’s The Bugle comic is being launched with a splish, a splash and a splosh at Consett Heart on Friday 26th June. Get yourself along for a night of musical entertainment from The Tunisians, Lee Harrison and One Dollar Zombies.

The Bugle is a grown-up tribute to the British children’s comics of yore. Here’s some sneak previews from its pages, by the wonderful John Bagnall…

The Bugle Summer Special also features stories by regular Ugly Mug contributors Ed Pinsent and Marc Baines. And an all-new House of Harley three pager: the return of Lady Backenforth – she’s the Lord of the Manor – in another battle with the scamps of Slackdale…

Original artwork from The Bugle will be on sale, along with comics, postcards and Slackdale Pickles! The exhibition opens at 5.30pm and the music begins at 7pm. Entry is free but any donations go to keeping Consett Heart open.

Meanwhile, if you haven’t got issue one of The Bugle, there’s a few copies still available for just £5+p&p in John Bagnall’s Etsy store. Snap it up while you can.