We were lucky to catch up with Alyssa Ruggieri recently and have shared our conversation below.

Alyssa, appreciate you joining us today. Do you wish you had started sooner?

In some aspects yes. I think I put off a creative/artist career path for so long because our society just drills the “poor struggling artist” narrative into our brains. Even though I’ve alway had a family thats been very supportive, I think I was the one who doubted the career path the most. So I tried to switch into other professional roles. I just kept pushing it ( the idea of a creative career) off to the side. Even when I started to grow my creative career just as a hobby, I didn’t really believe I could be good enough to make a career out of it at first. But at the same time I knew no other career path would click as much as this one did. So yes I do wish I allowed myself to start sooner to some degree. But at the same time, I think all of the jobs I had prior really shaped the artist and career I have now, so I wouldn’t change the course of action if I could, just the feelings of doubt that I had. I didn’t devote myself full time to my art and my business until I was laid off from my other jobs at the beginning of the pandemic. In a weird way it was really the shove I needed ( being laid off, not the pandemic), to push the fear aside and take on my art business full time. I think my past job experiences also helped me to see what I didn’t want in a job and what I wanted to bring into my own business.

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

I have always been creative, and enjoyed being creative in all aspects of life. But if you would have told me years ago that I would have my own business, and that I was an artist, I would think that you were crazy. I always imagined myself working for another company doing some line of designing or creative work. I went to school for apparel design, but haven’t touched a sewing machine since I graduated, and I don’t ever ever plan to.

After many career path changes and contemplations, I decided to make a side hobby out of my art back in 2018. I started sheepishly posting pictures of my art on Instagram. I had never painted with watercolor before, only acrylics, but all of my acrylics were dried u[. So I grabbed a very old, three dollar Michaels crafts store watercolor palette and started to paint gifts and cards for my friend and family. A friend asked me to paint her some Christmas cards with bunnies on them since she could never find ones that she liked. This was the kind of challenge I loved. She thought I was going to give her one card design, I gave her 5. I had them printed on cards, and fell in love with seeing my art in print. That definitely lit the creative fire in me. I painted a few more and sold them solely by word of mouth to family and friends. My mom being the wonderful mom that she is sold them to co workers in her break room. The cards were popular, and for some reason I convinced myself that I could paint anything people wanted and started taking commission orders from friends and family. Although I do pride myself in having a knack for figuring out creative challenges when I need to. I still had very little education in watercolor painting.

In January of 2019, I really dove into painting. I took every online course I could find, on things that seemed SO challenging to me at the time, but now are like second nature. Someone would ask me to paint their dog, and I would look up a class on painting a dog, and then apply that knowledge to the painting. I loved, and still love taking classes to improve my skills and learn new techniques. I just really fell in love with the medium of watercolor. When I started to sell my art in person more, people would tell me “oh, watercolor is so hard”, or ” you’re so talented”. And while I appreciate the kind words, I don’t think I’m more talented than the next person. They don’t see the hours of classes that go into my work. But those are all hours that I enjoyed, even the challenging parts of it, I found so rewarding, and thats why watercolor stuck with my and I think thats why I was able to grow my skills so quickly. I have piles and piles and piles of “failed” paintings, and mess-ups. But I still just kept painting. I would wake up at 5 am to paint a birthday card order for someone, because I wanted to. I would come home from work and paint another painting.

In the summer of 2019 I finally sold my art in public for the first time. I was grossly unprepared, but was still surprisingly successful and overwhelmed with all of the positive feedback and support I received. I’ll be the first person to tell you that I can be disorganized and an avid procrastinator, but, I pride myself on how resourceful I am, and that I will put 1000% into something. After selling through the holidays, I knew thats what I wanted to do, but just wasn’t sure how yet. Cue, the pandemic. I had planned to apply to apply to alot of craft shows and really grow my business if i could, but then everything was cancelled. So like a lot of people I did that hard pivot, and started to slowly grow my business online through Etsy at first. Now I think, if I got through starting a business and selling during a pandemic, then I really can get through anything. That year I was really just focusing on keeping the ball rolling in my business as best as I could. So the following yearI finally had a chance to go back to the foundation, and figure out a real plan for my business and my art. I launched my website and business re-brand last May.

My name is Alyssa Ruggieri, I am the owner and artist of ALR Designs. I create watercolor art for you to love and love to share. My pieces range from serene landscapes, to whimsical sharks, framable greeting cards and truly unique custom shell art, coined as “Shell Ladies”. The ongoing “Shell Ladies” collection is a modern interpretation of shell art, and features original watercolor paintings with seashells meticulously formed in the place of their garments. I currently paint, design, and print all of my own greeting cards and art prints. I love creating pieces that inspire, and just make people smile.

ALR Designs now offers a wide variety of products featuring her artwork ranging from stickers, to cards, prints, ornaments, and more. We sell online, and at in person events. Through selling online and in person, we have sold art to every state in the U.S as well as 12 other countries worldwide. We opened a wholesale division of ALR Designs and now sell in shops all across Cape Cod, as well as 4 other states, as we continue to grow this division.

When I sell my art in person, I get to see how people engage, and resonate with artwork that I’ve created. It’s a feeling like not other. It still doesn’t feel real to me that my artwork, my paintings that I created at my desk, are now hanging on the walls of homes all across the country. Getting emails from customers saying they cried opening my painting is always the best, and really makes all of the 1am painting sessions worth it. One of my favorite moments, was at one of my first few shows. A mother and daughter had looked at my greeting cards. The little girl was so in love with it. They left, and then a little while later the mom came back to buy the card because her daughter insisted that she use her allowance money to get it. Her mother had later messaged me online, that they watch all of my painting videos and her daughter now wants to take art classes. So I love that I get to inspire kids to pursue their art now.

ALR Designs continues to grow and evolve and we have a lot of new fun projects on the horizon.

For you, what’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative?

Seeing how different people resonate with my paintings is always so rewarding. I made it a goal of mine early on to paint what makes me happy, so my subject matter changes a lot. Some might find it poor business practice that I didn’t niche down, but I get to see so many different types of customers interact with my art and I love that. I know what it is like to buy a piece that you love even if you don’t know why, something in it just strikes you and it makes you happy. So the fact that I can give that feeling someone else with what I create is so rewarding.

How can we best help foster a strong, supportive environment for artists and creatives?

In our economy it can be hard to justify buying the art that I sell over the less expensive art you could buy at a big brand store. I don’t think theres any shame in buying discount art from big box stores, sometimes thats all we can afford. But if you are in a place to be able to afford it, buy from local artists and don’t ask why it costs so much or proclaim that it’s so expensive, or ask for a discount. It can be so disheartening when someone asks for a discount I think when you’re not an artist or small business owner it can be hard not to realize what goes into something.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.alr-designs.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/alr.designs/
• Facebook: https://m.facebook.com/ALR-Designs-375673679954057/
• Other: tik tok: @alrdesigns pinterest: https://pin.it/1Dd1GwZ email list: bit.ly/whalehey