Blog

Ahhh... summer! My garden is bursting with new blooms every week. In addition to painting them (and filming quick painting tutorials with voice over - check out my Instagram & Facebook reels and TikTok's), I've decided to bring in something special to my silk scarf shop.  It is no secret that my illustrated square silk scarves were painstakingly painted and designed over months - I added them to the shop exactly a year ago.  This year I decided to offer something a little more light-hearted! 🌸 In addition to the existing 4 collections (Naturalist Notebook, Legendaria, Not So Junk Journal and In The Dark), I'm...

I'll tell you a little secret dream of mine: I would really love to illustrate a stamp. I sent my submission over exactly a year ago to USPS (United States Postal Service) art commission and even received a reply from Washington DC that they'd put me on the list. Even though it seems virtually impossible, I'm not losing hope! I draw a lot of inspiration from snail mail (and "the old ways" in general!), vintage ephemera and botanical illustration. I have combined all these things in my Postal Reminiscence design. (It had been completed a couple years before I submitted my art to USPS!)  It took a...

Recently I had the pleasure of collaborating with a very cool brand called Princess Awesome & Boy Wonder that focuses on creating kids' clothes unbound by the usual gender stereotypes. If your little princess wants a dress with a dinosaur, space or construction trucks, Princess Awesome got you! That goes the other way around with unicorns and other "girly" topics. Plus, they have lots of designs devoted to science, technology, adventures, animals and the list goes on! I created a design called Dino Tracks that will soon grace a new dress! I did a little interview with Eva St. Clair,...

Another important aspect of Rural Living for me is my childhood. I have always been a city girl but every summer my parents took me to my grandmother's house in the south of Russia where life just seemed to slow down. That house was a time capsule with linens from the 50s, vintage perfumes, vinyl records and vintage wallpaper. All those things fascinated me. I helped in the garden and did lots of household work including sewing, cooking and cleaning. It wasn't all fun and glamour - oh not at all! Forget the dishwasher and other modern day wonders. But...

As I'm preparing for my very first original watercolor art collection drop, I wanted to share some inspiration behind this creation.  What does Rural Living mean to me? And why did I choose it as my very first original art collection? Is it the cottagecore trend? Not really. It's that my life IS rural and New England countryside plays a huge role in my creative flow. Long walks in nature are my meditation and recharging process. Seasonal changes spark my creativity and influence my working process - always. I have a flower garden that I started from scratch and I...