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all my habits make me

The Baby

Behind the design: All My Habits Make ME

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The Baby
At first, it was all about the baby.

Originally, this painting was just going to hang on my wall. It was titled The Baby, and it was the littlest person in the painting who was situated right in the center of all the action. Even the female to the farthest left is actually pointing to the baby, but if you look at the angles and lines created by basically everything in the painting, it all points to the baby.

Choosing to use this painting for a commercial design meant that aspects would need to be changed at least a little. The bus driver is more visible in the original painting, for example. But I also chose to overlay certain objects with different textures and colors. In some cases, that needed to happen to block-out certain spaces more clearly.

The black is MORE black in the final design. I digitally painted over all the black areas in line with the flow of the objects so that the naturally occurring texture of the canvas and brush strokes wouldn’t draw the eye. It needed to be just black. Then in some of those black spots, I added an additional layer of colored texture, to help ground it a little bit. It’s subtle, but it makes a difference.

My choice
It evolved with the scope of the project.

The inspirational for this project is All My Habits Make ME (and is the design title). The idea of waiting for the bus and getting on it has always given me a certain feeling.

The anticipation of going somewhere, of riding to another location, watching out the window as we go.

In the painting and now the design, the bus is coming, it’s nearly at the bus stop where everyone is waiting. My habits make me. Daily decisions determine my future, bit by bit. Where is the bus going? MY CHOICE. So I added that digitally.

The destination is MY CHOICE, and that destination is affected by the habits I choose for myself, day to day and moment to moment. And it does make a difference. It isn’t irrelevant. Just remember to Be calm. Breathe.

These are the words written along the left side of the design. I think most people today maybe need to breathe a little bit. It’s hard to find the calm, the inner core. Breathe. With or without a mask, but breathe.

See the final design and all products created with it right on RedBubble.

All my habits make ME.

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A-line dress

How this started…

This project started in the midst of the 2020 pandemic lockdown, just a few months before I was diagnosed with cancer. I had read somewhere that doing things with your other hand was good exercise for your brain, so I decided to try painting left-handed. I didn’t know if I could functionally do it, but was keen to try.

I enjoyed painting this so much, it is now the first in a series of left-handed paintings. The theme is people, public transportation and gathering spaces – all the things I was yearning in the first lockdown.

Inspiring words are something that help me focus my thoughts and emotions. There is so much noise, so much distraction – and I don’t think I’m the only one who feels this way. So I’ve decided that my designs will incorporate words.

The title of the original painting is The Baby. In translating this work into a commercial design, it has evolved into All My Habits Make ME. These words came to my mind as a new mantra. If I remember that every moment, I make small decisions that affect me and who I will be in the future, that is empowering. Cancer be damned. 

As I reworked the design, I imagined having it on me somewhere, or on a friend, and wondered about where we might be, what we might do. I don’t do yoga, but I have a sister who loves it. I thought about her stretching into insane poses and thought, “Be calm. Breathe.” These words went on the design. It ties in; it’s about: “the habits that make me who I will be because they are who I am.”

To learn more about the painting and how I digitally reworked it to be wearable, visit Behind the Design.

Get the look! Check out the series and get full product details on RedBubble.

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All My Habits Make ME

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This is actually the first series I designed. It was, to say the least, a rough process and some of the products have been changed since the soft launch. Lessons learned.

The original artwork was painted on canvas. For the story on my inspiration and process for creating the original artwork, The Baby, GO HERE.

For a sneak peek behind the design and what it took to go from canvas artwork to a functional design that could be applied to a duffle bag (and the like), GO HERE.

CHECK OUT ALL OF THE PRODUCTS IN THIS STYLE RIGHT HERE IN MY REDBUBBLE CATALOGUE.

You can browse through all of my most recent artwork and the hundreds of products I‘ve designed on my RedBubble PROFILE HERE.