Birth announcement

Back in 2022 I had the privilege and honour to design the birth annoucement for my nephew. I tried out several designs and settled on the one you can see at the end of this post. The finished painting did not have the name on it – since it would be a surprise even for me – and the parents instead brought the final design to a print shop, where the painting was scanned, the colours were enhanced a little here and there, and the name was added.

The birth card is 12×13 cm – the painting is larger (A3 = 29,7 × 42 cm)

Used materials: Pencil, pen, ecoline, aquarel

Take a look at my designing process:

The first step was to make a little drawing with my idea (postcard size): a little baby with the family dog on a floating island, looking at the moon. The parents and I talked about the tree, the island, and the moon. The moon would have to be large enough to encompass the name of the newborn.

The next step was to try this out in pen and colours. I moslty used Ecoline here (Ecoline is known for its bright and vibrant colours based on dyes and gum arabic). I was happy with the colours, but wanted to refine the baby and add leaves to the tree – and of course, add a moon.

I intensified the colours, wishing the baby lots of vibrant colours, and wanted the universe in the design to be a bit wacky:

In consultation with the parents, I chose different colours: blue and pink, leading to this piece:

At this point, the parents asked for a few adjustments, which made me realize that designing by painting, and not on a drawing pad, takes much more time and effort. I took their adjustments and painted the final piece:

I do believe it was the best one yet!