Oh Hey! Welcome!
My journey in becoming a surface designer officially began after being laid off in December of 2024 from my position as a Technical Designer at a small backpack manufacturer (think pattern drafting, tech packs, and prototyping), which prompted me to reconsider my career trajectory. Surface design had been something that I had considered as a career, or at least a hobby, for awhile but the timing of everything seemed like the perfect opportunity to take the career change plunge!
There were a lot of hints and clues over the years that lead me to this career option, some of these instances included: creating custom SVGs for my Cricut machine, designing repeating prints for my previous employer, having an affinity for fabric, using original prints for branding on my previous blog and YouTube channel, and having the can-do-attitude of a DIYer.
Once making up my mind, I took Bonnie Christine's Immersion course last year, became Immersion certified, and have since finished a few collections and mini collections which I've put into a portfolio. Some of those pieces are available for viewing here, and if you are interested in seeing more work please don’t hesitate to reach out and I can supply you with a log in for the work I have on Artonomo.
I currently reside in the absolutely beautiful PNW with my husband and two black cats, Zinnia and Poe. My husband and I make sure to go on adventures around the immediate and distant areas on the regular, partaking in as much of the fantastic scenery and yummy food as we can. I also enjoy dabbling and completely immersing myself in other creative hobbies like sewing, video editing, and other miscellaneous DIYs and projects. Thanks for reading through till the end, I’m so glad you’re here! oxox
My Process:
I absolutely love taking photos that document my life adventures, especially around Oregon where I currently reside (here’s a photo from the Wooden Shoe Tulip Festival 2025).
I’ll occasionally take these photos and then use them in my art! I’ll bring them into Procreate and then draw some of my favorite tulips (as seen above in this example). I also love doodling free hand in Procreate and using mediums like gouache, ink pens, graphite, and Prismacolor markers to draw in sketchbooks with preferably watercolor weight paper.
Above you can see an example of a line drawing that I’ve done in Procreate that I then export into Illustrator to be converted into a vector. For work that I’ve done in a sketchbook it’s a very similar process, I take a photo of the piece with my phone, then export the image into Illustrator to be vectorized with image trace.
After vectorizing my drawings I then color them in and then begin the fun task of arranging them into repeats! See above for an example of a final repeat from the mini collection, Goth Garden!
Past Work:
I was invited to contribute to the 2025 edition of the Spooky Little Halloween zine! This project was so much fun, because it entailed me creating a mini collection of Halloween themed repeats, later to be named Candy Haul, as well as designing a Halloween countdown calendar and some coordinating activity cards to go inside the calendar’s pockets. You can still purchase the calendar panel in six different color ways, as well as coordinating backing fabric from my Spoonflower shop if you are interested in making one of these for yourself!
Contact:
britnijade.design@gmail.com