Top Designer Kristen De Palma

*Nova Scotia Honey Art by Kristen De Palma*

Kristen De Palma is a lettering and mural artist based in Halifax, Nova Scotia. With a 10+ year career that began in marketing and design, Kristen has ensured that clients’ messages will connect with their target audience, from Instagrammable moments to integrated campaigns. You can find Kristen’s murals in dozens of locations around Nova Scotia and beyond, as she partners with local townships to create meaningful, eye-catching artwork that represents an area’s unique character and brightens communities. She sources much of her inspiration from the Victorian era, where the artwork was ornate, decorative, and detailed, even inspiring her most recent personal project, To & From, a product line of seed packets and thoughtful gifts inspired by floriography.

Hi Kristen! Tell us about yourself - how did you get to where you are today and when did you first become interested in design and illustration?

I’ve had an interest in illustration for as long as I can remember - most of my childhood was spent drawing and entering coloring contests! Art was always my favorite class right through to high school. But, it had never been something that I considered as a career - that just never seemed like an option to me. So once I graduated high school and art class wasn’t a requirement, I basically retired my sketchbook and pencils.

When I began in university (studying communications/marketing), I landed a job with the university as a marketing assistant which meant I was also their graphic designer. I was totally winging it, but I realized that I really enjoyed designing! It led me to get a diploma in graphic and web design after my university degree, and I began freelancing for various clients through word of mouth. Once I graduated, I had a full-time job as a marketer and designer for a film company.

I’ve always maintained some sort of side hustle - I owned my own pet-sitting and dog-walking business and did freelance design for clients alongside my 9-5 for many years.

Lettering and Mural Artist Kristen De Palma

“Create and share your work, interact with the online community, support your local businesses and get yourself out there.

The only way to get better and get new projects is by being active. Small steps end up making big moves!”

Back around 2010, I learned about hand lettering and was so intrigued. I came across a Skillshare class by Mary Kate McDevitt and signed up - but never followed through with completing the lessons. Thankfully, lettering found me again in 2015 when I signed up for a 1-day calligraphy class at my local university. Immediately, it felt right to be lettering and I became obsessed with practicing. I literally spent hours every day filling dozens of sketchbooks. I quickly moved from calligraphy to hand lettering, as I wanted to experiment with different styles and incorporating illustrations. My husband is also an artist, and his encouragement really helped me to stick with it because it was so frustrating at first. He taught me the concept of “pencil mileage,” so I began looking at all the bad sketches I drew as steps closer to what I wanted to be drawing, rather than just giving up. He could somehow see the potential in my work when I just wanted to crumple up my sketchbook pages.

When I was feeling confident enough in my artwork to start posting my lettering work to Instagram, I’d get some commission requests from friends and family - and eventually, some client requests started coming my way. I just kept creating new work and sharing it consistently. Over the 10 years I’ve been lettering, I don’t think I’ve gone more than a couple of days without at least drawing a little bit. Graduating from my sketchbook to my iPad (back in 2020) was a level-up for my client work as it then allowed me to create high-quality illustrations that could be used for editorial, book covers, art licensing, etc.

I’ve always seen a ton of value in learning from others, so over the years I’ve invested in professional development like attending sign painting courses with Mike Meyer and Joby Carter to keep myself challenged and inspired.

Like many others, COVID allowed some time for me to pause and think about what I wanted to be doing for a living. My corporate job at the time was stressful and not rewarding creatively. I loved the freedom of working from home so much and dreaded the idea of going back into a beige office. In April 2021, I made the decision to start saving all the income I was getting from my lettering hustle, and put in my notice come the fall. I was SO worried that I wouldn’t make enough money and that I wouldn’t be busy enough - turns out, I’m incredibly grateful that I’ve stayed consistently busy and I’ll be celebrating three years in business this November!

How would you describe your aesthetic, and how has your design style changed over time?

I would describe my aesthetic as vintage-inspired, detailed, and vibrant. To create something new, I love to look to something old - I’m incredibly inspired by the Victorian era of design, where everything was hand-drawn and intricately detailed. I love to incorporate a lot of movement within my designs by using flourishes, swirls and flowing script.

When I started out, I didn’t have the muscle memory yet to be able to draw the letters I really wanted to be drawing and I hadn’t developed my style. So first, I started with calligraphy, then brush lettering, and soon began experimenting with various styles of hand lettering. I really loved having letters interact with each other and adding tons of detail - early on, this made much of my work illegible (haha). Over time, I figured out a good balance of maintaining legibility while also incorporating lots of intentional details. I began incorporating illustrations and honed my rendering skills, and started adding textures and details that leveled up my work.

Painting murals also helped evolve my design style, as it forced me to think about how I would render my designs without the help of an iPad/digital tools. I couldn’t get too over the top with textures and details because I wasn’t comfortable yet with paint as a medium. Working as an artist full-time also evolved my lettering content. I began lettering less of what was super-niche and appealed to only me, and more of what would resonate with commercial clients and my audience.

Are there particular themes you like to explore through your work? What drew you to lettering specifically?

I really love exploring pride of place as a theme within my work, as I’m often tasked with creating murals for communities that tap into their unique identities. People are so proud of where they grew up and where they come from, and I love getting the opportunity to build a sense of place for an area through art. Many clients want to reflect a place through the depiction of iconic landmarks, but I also love an opportunity to go less literal and pull in things like natural botanicals or pull in forgotten history to represent an area’s unique identity.

Something just seemed to click when I started drawing letters. I remember experimenting with different handwriting styles back when passing notes in junior high was my day-to-day, and then when my family got a computer (oh god, I’m old!) I loved trying out different fonts when submitting school projects. I’m sure my teachers really appreciated getting a book report entirely in some sort of ridiculous, decorative font from the 90s. So I guess I’ve really had an interest in letters for as long as I can remember. Hand lettering just brings such a charm that can’t be achieved with fonts. You can truly feel when something is hand-drawn and one-of-a-kind!

Over the course of your career, you’ve created beautiful murals for a wide range of clients - what’s your creative process like when working on a mural?

Sometimes, a client will have a clear vision of what they want the mural to be, but most often they look to me to generate a concept - and that’s my absolute favorite part of the mural process!

I always start with the “why” behind a mural - is it to inspire employees at an office? To encourage photos from tourists? To welcome customers? With that in mind, I’ll put myself in the mindset of the target audience as well as learn as much as I can about the client. I always want to ensure that my work connects to something meaningful, so often a good place to start is by digging into the history of an area or company to help inform the design, or by collecting community input.

I present clients with 2-3 mural concepts initially and begin with rough sketches, incorporating their feedback until we’ve landed on a winner.

The most stressful part of a mural project for me is always getting the design transferred to the wall - I’m most comfortable with projecting, but that’s not always possible. Once the design is up there, painting it is so enjoyable and I love how much people love seeing the process of it all come together.

What are your thoughts on the power of public art to transform spaces and what do you hope people walk away with after viewing your work?

Public art has such a powerful impact for creating a sense of place and can really transform communities. This is especially evident in the cities and towns that invest in mural festivals, because a large amount of public art in a concentrated area turns an otherwise faded community into something vibrant that people want to go out and re-discover.

With my artwork, I always want to make people feel good. There is enough negativity in the world and sometimes, just seeing a certain message can brighten your whole day. Whether it’s feeling a sense of pride for where they are, or a spark of hope, I would love it if people feel just a little bit better after viewing my work in their community.

Tell us about To & From Gift Co., your incredible shop that features beautiful Floriography seed packets and other gifts- what was the catalyst that led you to start To & From? Can you tell us more about your seed packets?

To & From Gift Co. is my little baby! Back in 2020, I drew a series of illustrated seed packets because I had been inspired by this gorgeous Victorian seed catalogue I came across in an antique shop. I couldn’t believe how beautiful and ornate these illustrations were, because all the seed packets I was used to seeing were boring stock photos and basic fonts. I drew a set of nine seed packets, sold some prints of the designs, and a local media source reached out to me to commission a process video of one of the packets and did a feature story about them. I’m a big believer in taking little wins like these as a sign that you’re headed in the right direction, but at the time I didn’t really have the mental capacity to pursue the seed packet project further and basically moved onto other things because the pandemic year was absolutely wild.

Flash forward to 2023 and, having a little over a year of time away from a 9-5 and the head space to begin thinking about personal projects, I decided I wanted to do another series of hand-drawn seed packets but this time, actually sell them as seed packets people could grow. I also wanted the packets to have a special meaning that would turn them into a giftable item rather than a traditional gardening item. The Victorian ‘secret language of flowers’, floriography, was so cool to me and so I started researching all the symbolism behind different flowers. I thought maybe a few local shops would be interested in carrying them and I started really small, with just 50 packets of each of the 10 designs I initially developed.

I’m coming up on a year of To & From Gift Co. and I now have 23 designs (and so many more in the wings!) and the packets are carried in dozens of shops all across North America, along with prints and cards of the designs. To & From is a personal passion project that I truly look forward to working on whenever I have the time to. If I won the lottery and could work on whatever I wanted to, I would 100% spend my days drawing flower seed packets.

What has been one of your favorite projects to work on recently and why?

Outside of To & From Gift Co., one of my favorite recent projects was a mural I just painted for PepsiCo & FritoLay Canada. They initially reached out to me looking for a mural for their staff lunch room, but when I visited them to discuss the project, I noticed they have this huge long hallway as soon as you enter their facility. It was very daunting and just a big white wall. So I decided to pitch them on the idea of doing a mural in it that celebrates the company’s 70-year history and they were all for it. I created a design that calls out milestones dating back to 1952, and a “Welcome to Kentville” area at the beginning to localize and differentiate the office from other facilities.

It was so fun to paint all the different logos (back when logos used to all be hand-lettered - like the original Pepsi-Cola logo - swoon!) and snack characters. It’s a busy hallway, so I got to hear all of the employee reactions as the mural was going up - people were proudly picking out the milestones they remember and noting the year they started at the company. It was so awesome to see the mural working in real-time!

What’s been one of the biggest career lessons you've learned so far?

A major lesson that I’ve learned (and continue to work on) is that it’s OK - and often super beneficial - to say no! Over time, I’ve learned what projects I really love and which ones are draining or not worth it.

Everything is a tradeoff, so when you say yes to everything, you’re saying no to so many other things as a result. Saying no to some projects opens up your capacity to explore personal projects and go after the work you really want to do. It’s scary at first, because you’re turning paying clients away, but it’s so important. Choose quality over quantity every time.

Where do you find creative inspiration? Do you have any favorite design resources?

My favorite place to find creative inspiration is in antique stores! Bygone eras had so many things hand-drawn and an attention to detail that just doesn’t seem to exist today. I love looking at old tins, advertisements, catalogs, signs, etc. because they just have so much character and history.

I also really love listening to Andy J. Pizza’s “Creative Pep Talk” podcast. He seems to always feature topics that hit at just the right time, and he’s so fun to listen to. He touches on so many themes that are super relevant to creatives and like the podcast name says, gives you a boost of motivation!

What advice would you give to artists and designers just starting out?

My advice would be just that - just start! Create and share your work, interact with the online community, support your local businesses and get yourself out there. The only way to get better and get new projects is by being active. Small steps end up making big moves!

Also, I would suggest that they connect with others in their community to build their network. This can be so valuable. As much as I love to work independently, when I left my corporate career, I was a little nervous about not having people to collaborate with, get feedback or learn from anymore. I made connections with local painters, other women business owners in my area, and all have helped me with projects or with working through various challenges over the years. If you just get past the initial awkwardness of reaching out, people are usually more than willing to connect with you!

When you look to the future, what are you excited about?

I’m excited about it ALL! I continue to be surprised by some of the projects and opportunities that come my way, and while it can be somewhat scary to look forward and think, “I don’t know what projects I’ll be working on this fall yet” - it’s mostly exciting to me. This time last year, I had no idea that I’d have clients like adidas or PepsiCo in my future, or that my seed packets would be carried across North America. The more experience I have as a business owner, the more comfortable and confident I’ve become in the ‘unknown’. Who knows what exciting projects lie ahead?!

Thank you for sharing with us Kristen! To view more of Kristen’s work, visit her website, check out To & From Gift Co., and follow her on Instagram.

Kristen was nominated by Noun Project. All art courtesy of Kristen De Palma.

Kristen De Palma