The Puffin Prints origin story..

Well, first of all, I'd like to say hello! I'm Rachel, the puppeteer behind all the puffin paintings, this website, and the Puffin Prints business (well, 50% of it, at least). I thought I would write a little blog post to explain in a more personal way how Puffin Prints came about, about who I am, what I'm doing and why, and hopefully just satisfy your curiosity a little bit. You did click the post, after all! Puffin Prints is a new business, currently consisting of myself, Rachel, as the 'artist,' which is the official title I take when discussing the business, but I also do a lot more than just create the art! The other person involved in the business is actually my Mum, Deborah. We are the cheesy mother-daughter-best-friends, but don't click away just yet, don't worry, I'm not writing the screen-play for a rom-com, just giving a little background about how we manage to keep the business going without burning everything down in the midst of a fight (since we're not in a comedy!). Anyway, Mum- it feels strange to keep typing Deborah, because she is my Mum, so I hope you don't mind if I keep referring to her as such- is responsible for a lot of the management roles, she makes a lot of the phone calls, she's largely in charge of the social media side of things - otherwise it'd all just be pictures of me eating cake, drinking tea and doodling - and lots of other things too. Fortunately, during business hours, we work as a team of equals, and not as artist-and-manager or mother-and-daughter, and so far, it works very well. Now that I've waffled on a bit about our roles in the business, and you've 'met' us (well, sort of), I can now explain the story of how it all began, with a little context. A short history of me, myself and I... I am your classic little bookworm, the school geek, the science nerd. Throughout all of school, I was keen to learn, teacher's pet, top of the class. Do you hate me yet? No, really, I don't think I was hated, I thoroughly enjoyed my school life, I had excellent friends and lovely teachers. Anyway, back to the point, although I have always loved painting, doodling, drawing etc, I have also always loved mathematics, science, english, the lot of them. So when sixth form came around, I was stumped. I didn't know what I wanted to do, which path I wanted to go down in the long run. I had a long-standing love of art, having spent most nights up until 2am painting by dim lamp light- I wouldn't recommend it, not the dim lamp part, at least get yourself good lighting if you're going to paint in the dark, my eyesight is terrible- but I also spent many nights up until very late reading Physics textbooks and doing Mathematics problems (no, really..!). So, being the practical and logical type (I can hear you laughing, Mum) I decided that there would better career prospects for me if I went with the academic route, I'd take Physics, Maths, Further Maths, Chemistry, Biology, and I'd see which A Levels I enjoyed most, then follow that course to university, graduate, get a high-paying job somewhere in Switzerland, and just draw as a hobby. This all went (surprisingly) well until the second/third year of University, where I was studying Theoretical Physics, where I realized I missed art terribly and perhaps I'd made a terrible choice. However, already nearly at the end of the degree, I thought I may as well complete it, and then re-evaluate after that. This was around January time, and Mum's birthday was coming up in February. Being away, I thought it would be nice to send her a card in the post, but I'm not usually one for buying birthday cards, I like making my own. So I painted a card, thinking of Anglesey and how I missed it, sent it off in the post, wishing her a Happy Birthday, and just like that, Puffin Prints was born. That easy. Mum loved the Paddlin' Puffin picture I'd sent to her, so much so she thought we should print more cards with the same design, and so we did. Still for sale today, the Paddlin' Puffin card was (and still is) a big hit on Anglesey, thanks to the neighbouring Puffin Island, resident to many a puffin even now. From there, I graduated University with a degree in Theoretical Physics, and started a business called Puffin Prints in partnership with my Mum, and so far, I have never been happier!

Thanks for reading my first blog post, I'm not very good at writing these yet, but hopefully with time, persistence, and caffeine, I'll get better! Hope to see you again soon, Rachel x

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