Hello everybody! Here's my blog

Hello everybody! Today I finally started my first blog ever. Wow!

I've been thinking about blogging for literally years and never started. 

I really liked the idea of writing about Illustration and Art in general, but never really decided when to start. I guess sometime great ideas can be a bit overwhelming... but finally I started. I really like the writing part as well: so I hope you will enjoy too. I would love to talk about the things I am working on (interesting projects are coming!), topics like illustration, surface design and art in general, maybe tools or classes as well. I hope this is something you'll enjoy to read and that can become a useful resource for other illustrators and graphic artists out there.

So to start today I would love to let you know something more about me in case you are not familiar with my work. Hello, I am Valeria Frustaci, illustrator and surface designer from Italy, currently based in NYC (and it's been almost 9 years since I moved in the States!). I earned a bachelor in Architecture, but very soon I realized I wanted to be an illustrator and I enrolled in a two years course in Visual Design and Illustration in Milan, which gave me the tools to start, right away, my career as an Illustrator: during summer 2011, right after I graduate, I received an amazing email from a Publisher in Italy which was asking me to illustrate 4 books about animals! It was awesome! That was my very beginning. 

Lately I am focusing more on illustration and surface design. I am building a new portfolio (or to be honest, a few portfolios!) and I am looking forward to starting new interesting collaborations. Right now you can see some of my designs, thanks to the collaboration with DenyDesign and Society6, at Target and Indigo, which makes me super proud. I am also working with Touchnote and Thortful: I have many greeting cards available to purchase!

A few months ago I also started to upload my patterns on Spoonflower, a platform dedicated to fabric! It's an amazing POD that I recommend to check out. They are also specialized in wallpaper and home decor... a lot of great ideas there!

Maybe you don't know but I am also a Skillshare teacher and I am planning to record new interesting online classes in the next coming months, so stay tuned! Also, if you are not familiar with Skillshare, click here to get one free month access to all the classes on the platform. I really enjoyed being a student there: you can really find amazing courses about illustration (and not only).

Last but not least, if you want to stay up-to-date about my work, you can subscribe my newsletter here. I promise not to bother frequently :)

Thanks for now and ciao!

Valeria