We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Tricia K. Otwell a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Tricia, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. How did you learn to do what you do? Knowing what you know now, what could you have done to speed up your learning process? What skills do you think were most essential? What obstacles stood in the way of learning more?

For the most part I’ve gone with the trial by fire approach, thankfully that has worked for me. I am always chasing a vision within a theme. That theme may be the remodel of a client’s bedroom, or it may be a life like prop for a large event or a whimsical spin on a holiday piece. If people could hear my thoughts! My mind is constantly spinning on ideas and how to execute them as life-like or as in as much detail as I can. I’m not one that can sit still long enough to watch how to videos. Which is crazy because so many brilliant people have worked out the kinks but I need that resistance I feel searching through my own imagination for the how! All in all I’ve taught myself. I would picture what I wanted to bring to life in my mind and deconstruct it till I saw how I could put it together. The more ideas I have brought to life the more I have learned to trust my muses.

Things that would have sped up the process would be not always thinking I have to make everything. There are so many items readily available now that the production time could be faster without starting from scratch. And learning more about what art materials do. How do different adhesives work…what mediums will help create the finish I am seeking. The most essential skill is a combination of patience and fearlessness. For my work the two rarely leave one another and the more I bring of each of them the better my work is and the happier I am in the creative flow.

The only true obstacle has only ever been me. Sure, lack of resources at times. I can always say not enough time. All very valid. But in the end I am the only voice that has ever slowed me down. Now I am learning to use that voice to push myself and trust my ideas, more fearlessness, less overthinking.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers?

My business and my brand are always evolving. I have not yet mastered a visual presentation of myself from a branding sense but when I think of what that would look like words such as bespoke, unfettered, bold, and classic come to mind. I am fortunate that I manage to operate in several areas of creativity through my business. My art crosses through interior design, commissioned artwork, holiday pieces and holiday installs both residential and commercial. I call my studio The Luxe Lab. At any given time there may be paintings in progress on more than one easel, a bunny driving a carrot car half way finished on the work table, a furniture piece being redesigned, and fabric swatches for a client’s bedding on another table.

I am incredibly proud that my business has grown almost solely from referrals. And truthfully many of my clients have become very close friends. Whether it’s picking out a piece of furniture or painting a huge canvas I truly put my heart and soul into that project, it is very personal to me. So for a client or buyer to feel that connection and trust that enough to tell others, there is no bigger compliment!

Not sure where to begin about who I am? I am a mom. My daughter has extreme special needs and that has, and continues to shape my business. I have started and stopped so many times along this journey because of her level of need. That’s not sacrifice, that’s just being a mom. Learning to find balance in that is still one of my biggest challenges. My creative flow runs on my daughter’s schedule which is the antithesis of how most creatives operate. She is my biggest cheerleader though and tells everyone that she’s gonna be an artist one day like her mommy. She likes to sit on the other side of my work table and have Luxe Lab time as she calls it. She will color and I will work and inevitably she will interrupt me a zillion times or some days she’s lost in her project and I get to be productive.

I am a wife. My husband is the most encouraging voice I have ever had. He built The Luxe Lab for me to have a space to work more effectively. He is the type that thinks through everything to make it as functional as it can be. It made him crazy that I hung a huge neon sign on the back wall that is all pegboard because he wanted me to have a place to hang all my paints and tools and odds n ends. Where he was creating efficiency I was focused on it being pretty. But he sees me, the real me. He constantly tells me to just be fully who I am. No matter how crazy my idea is, he’s always there to offer solutions or materials or muscles. He’s incredibly talented and builds my frames, repairs furniture I am working on, and is my contractor/handyman on larger design jobs. More than anything he is my best friend. My heart is very full.

Random fun facts….I love the outdoors, total moon child. Animal lover extreme. Passionate equestrian. I love long range shooting. And I can only sit still to read a good book!

We’d love to hear the story of how you turned a side-hustle into something much bigger.

Definitely started as a side hustle! But the steps from there to here really only line up the way God draws a plan. First thing I made was a miniature top hat. I can’t sew. Well, I can sew but I can’t follow a pattern (this loops back to my not being willing to watch videos or take lessons!) and I wanted to launch a children’s clothing line (big stretch from there to painter yes I know) so somehow I got connected with a pattern maker out of New York and she asked me join a private Facebook group with three other moms (all master seamstresses thank you very much). Our first group assignment was to follow one of her patterns for a little girl’s skirt and each put our own spin on the look. My daughter was about four at the time so I planned on her being my model when we all submitted photos of our final design. Knowing my outfit would end with fabric glue I knew I had to do something unexpected to complete the ensemble. How I landed on a miniature top hat I don’t recall. But I did, and I just kept cutting up poster board and gluing it together till it looked like a hat. Then covered that in fabric and added embellishments. Next thing I knew I was shipping miniature top hats, miniature crowns, all sorts of over the top headwear all over the world, Australia, France, England, and all over America. I had to back away after a while because the demand of my daughter’s needs plus the growing business were not a healthy recipe. A year or two later a friend asked for an over the top (that seems to be my niche) fall wreath so I created this velvet and leopard attired scarecrow wreath and and all of a sudden I had a huge demand for holiday wreaths. That turned into designing and installing Christmas decor all over north Texas. Then just as before there weren’t enough hours in the day and I stepped away from the glue gun for a while. But those experiences were both huge milestones for me. In both of them I found my creative voice. I learned how to communicate with clients, how to plan for and track materials. And I learned that by putting my work out there consistently I could create a consistent following.

Years passed and I developed an interest in alcohol inks. I never considered myself an artist because in my mind an artist is a painter. And mercy, I could not paint! I thought alcohol inks would be easy (anyone who has worked with them knows just how wrong I was!) but I was hooked. Then a friend commissioned me to paint a huge piece for her husband’s office. I was terrified. But just like that I was an artist. Fast forward through a few very dark years in my personal life, add the unfaltering support and encouragement of my husband and The Luxe Lab came to life.

All in all it wasn’t about how or with what I started. Nor about how many times I stopped along the way for life to happen. It was that I never let the dream die out and suddenly there was this moment that I was free to breathe into it full bore. Scariest most exhilarating thing that could ever happen. Now it morphs just as crazily as mini top hats to giant paintings but it’s all intentional and part of my scope — that is where I function best and when I am at my best I give my clients my best work. It’s a gift to be creative. It’s a luxury to get to do that everyday. It’s an honor to share it with others.

What’s a lesson you had to unlearn and what’s the backstory?

Gosh, this is such a deep one. Here goes, I had to unlearn shrinking back and hiding who I am. Growing up and through some unhealthy relationships I took on a belief that I had to be a certain way. Which in essence was perfect. As long as I could do and be perfect then everything would be smooth and safe. So whenever that little creative wild child in me poked her head out it stirred tremendous discord. I took on the belief the issue was me being too much. Too intense. Too out there. Too head in the clouds. Too many ideas. Too bright a light. Took me a long time to learn that nobody has too bright a light…oftentimes we just are too close to people’s dark spots and they don’t want our light outshining them. It has taken a tremendous amount of accountability and healing on my part to no longer apologize for where I burn brightest. Sometimes that is still a little scary but it gets easier and easier. As the movie line says, “no body puts baby in the corner”, I won’t ever be put in the corner again. Shine on!

Contact Info:

• Instagram: @TriciaKOtwell
• Facebook: Tricia K Otwell, Artist at The Luxe Lab
• Other: email [email protected]

Image Credits
All images are taken by/owned by Tricia K Otwell