We were lucky to catch up with Jessica Miller recently and have shared our conversation below.

Jessica, appreciate you joining us today. We’d love to hear the backstory behind a risk you’ve taken – whether big or small, walk us through what it was like and how it ultimately turned out.

I worked as a corporate graphic designer for several years and usually felt stuck at my job for the paycheck. After having kids I started teaching graphic design part-time at a small college. I did freelance design on the side. I loved teaching and liked the freedom of freelance but it always felt like a hussle and it was kind of hard to ever feel like I could relax and not stress about where the next job was coming from. I eventually went back to corporate for that reason. Which again made me feel stuck. I decided to try licensing my work. I started off as doing it just on the side at night and on the weekends until I felt confident I could quit my day job that I hated. I took the plunge into licensing full time five years ago and have never looked back.

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

My brand, Owl & Toad, started in 2012 as a line of bottle label designs for home brewers and weddings. It quickly grew into other types of stationery, surface designs and art prints for sale online and in stores such as Target, Minted, The Knot, GreenVelope, Mpix, Postable, Mixtiles, H-E-B, PBTeen, Brides, and The Frame TV by Samsung.

As a licensing artist I don’t design directly for clients like a freelancer would. I basically design stationery or do photography based on what I like and what inspires me. Then I show a portfolio of work to partners and they decide if or what they’d like to sell. Payment is different for each partner depending on the contract I have with them.

I’m inspired by nature, warm colors, and anything with a lot of texture. Most weekdays you’ll find me in my studio creating designs or editing photos. On the weekends I’m usually roaming around taking pictures.

What do you find most rewarding about being a creative?

The thing I love the most about being a licensing artist is the creative freedom. Essentially I get to create what I like instead of trying to create something for a client based on their preferences. Working this way has made my creative muscles stronger. I have more ideas and I feel like I’m able to execute an idea and dial stuff in quickly.

Any insights you can share with us about how you built up your social media presence?

I use my instagram account as a portfolio. I don’t worry too much about how many followers I have or how many likes I get on any single post. I try to keep it up to date with my most recent and favorite work while using relevant hashtags. I don’t post things that aren’t relevant to my work to try to boost my following and prefer to spend my time creating actual work rather than creating for an algorithm that could change at any moment. It is pretty amazing to me that even with my small following, many of my partners have found me, instead of me reaching out to them, based on my Instagram portfolio.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.owlandtoad.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/owlandtoad/
• Other: https://www.minted.com/store/owlandtoad https://www.postable.com/cards/artist/owl-and-toad https://www.greenvelope.com/user/designs/ https://mixtiles.com/art/artist/Jessica%20Miller%20of%20Owl%20and%20Toad

Image Credits
My profile photo was taken by – Rocky Jones of Many Faced Media