We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Madeline Liu. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Madeline below.

Madeline, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today Can you talk to us about a project that’s meant a lot to you?

Part of the joy of being an illustrator is to story-tell meaningful life experiences. I’ll never forget three key projects I’ve done.

The first was a commission for a word-of-mouth customer who wanted to create a magical scene from a photo of where he and his girlfriend met. After we had it printed, they framed it, I heard back from him about a year and a half later that he was incredibly inspired by my ability to creatively bring his vision and emotion to life and that he was pivoting his career to pursue art! This moment warmed my heart and made me incredibly happy and thankful to do what I do.

The second project was from a customer who wanted to create a piece to commemorate a family member’s parents for Father’s Day. The project guidelines included a beautiful orchard that embodied their late lives, and details that reminded the family member of them. On the day the client gifted the piece and put it in a frame, she recorded and sent me a video of the relative crying, hugging, and simply feeling the emotion behind the intentional piece.

The third project was an album cover that would be created into a desk mat for a streamer. She had so much intentionality inside each piece and component she wanted to include, and even had a small tribute to a late streaming fan who passed away. Being able to create such emotional impact in my work seriously motivates me to keep going.

Madeline, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

Hello! My name is Madeline, the founder and illustrator behind Notebeans Stationery, an art brand aiming to story-tell meaningful life experiences through the dreamy adventures of three fictitious friends. My brand consists of three original characters—Kato the cat, Paya the penguin, and Kuma the Samoyed. Outside of my business, I’m a freelance social media marketer in the hospitality and nonprofit industry and a part-time artist hoping to share joy through my work. Today, I continue to create meaningful illustrations of life and share them with others to inspire them or to help them do the same through my Instagram content, my products, and commissions for businesses who want to tell their creative story.

The Journey: When I first started my business, it was during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic in August 2020, when California wildfires and AAPI attacks were on the rise. During this time, I felt overwhelmed and wanted to do something better with my money at the time. As I was getting back into art at this time, I started Notebeans Stationery as a way to generate donation funds for a project hosted by Global Giving to aid California firefighters at that time. From there, I illustrated as I waited for the next product to ship to me and before you knew it, I was building traction on Instagram and growing a community.

The Why: My mission at the time (and still today) was to bridge creativity and kindness, donating a portion of my profits towards charity projects through Global Giving. I felt hugely inspired by being able to engage in what I loved while still upholding some sense of CSR (corporate social responsibility), even if I was just a small business.

I feel incredibly empowered to talk to aspiring artists, fellow business owners/creatives, and people who simply are being their most genuine and authentic selves. I have hundreds of customers who deeply connect to the meaning behind each illustration I make and stories that accompany the art pieces.

Any resources you can share with us that might be helpful to other creatives?

Community! This translates to not only expanding your marketing efforts to 1) networking for creatives and 2) tabling at marketplaces and independent stores, but also putting yourself out there in shaking more hands and talking about your creative story.

Before I was involved in my local community groups, I felt extremely isolated and selling felt like I was pitching myself to a blank screen.

While social media is an incredible tool to connect with people, SO much insight can be gained from having meaningful conversations with customers, many of which have the next puzzle piece to expand/improve your business.

Being able to talk to creatives at a networking event about the struggle of getting client leads, managing an online store, or simply navigating everchanging marketing tactics for artists is such an incredible experience and can help your artistic sense of self feel heard in such an independent journey.

I would highly recommend looking in your community through word of mouth, social media, Eventbrite, Meetup, etc. to find creative networking events and marketplaces to vend at (even if the barrier to entry is high, the goal is leads!).

Can you share a story from your journey that illustrates your resilience?

My favorite example of resilience within my business has to be my Kickstarter campaign for my latest character plushies for Kato, Paya, and Kuma.

I set a goal of launching the plushies over a 30-day duration to raise $3,500. Months before launch day, I worked tirelessly during my last year of university to put together prelaunch campaign assets –landing pages, Kickstarter copy, graphics, reward tiers, budgets, product advertising, etc.

Although I had everything planned out (I’m an ENFJ and Enneagram Type 3w2 LOL), I didn’t expect at the halfway mark for the growth of the campaign to slow down.

Here, I decided to just be genuine and authentic to myself, and tell the story as it was. It was the first time in a long time to experience the power of organic, genuine marketing that came from the heart. Not from a sales perspective.

With just a couple of days left, I had reached the goal, I celebrated all over my social media and in person, and I was ready to put in my final deposit to the manufacturer to begin mass production of the plushies.

However, just two days later, my grandma had left after being in a nursing home for years. What an emotional roller coaster that was. Despite all the joy I felt, I had to let myself feel the grief. I created an art piece with a tiger (for her zodiac) to commemorate her, and even with the hype that followed the successful campaign, I let myself take a breather.

After about a month, I felt ready to get back to preparing for fulfillment logistics and infrastructure, and I knew my grandma would be (and still is) proud of me for who I was and who I will become.

So much deep emotion and impact happened this week, and I’m incredibly thankful for all the love my community showed me during those challenging weeks.

You can find the full Kickstarter campaign here as well: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/notebeansstationery/notebeans-stationery-plushies-the-dreamy-adventures-of-3?ref=user_menu

Contact Info:

• Website: https://notebeansstationery.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/notebeansstationery/
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/madelineliu/
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC9yjPJONKgf-Fmqw2ZEyWow
• Other: ➡️ Virtual Business Card: notebeansstationery.carrd.co
  ➡️ Commissions: notebeansstationery.com/pages/artcommissions
  ➡️ Virtual Art Gallery: notebeansstationery.com/pages/artgallery
  ➡️ Email me for wholesale inquiries, commissions, or other partnerships: [email protected]

Image Credits

📸 photographer Timothy Ly:
https://unsplash.com/@tikeoly
📸 photographer Jason Leung: https://unsplash.com/@ninjason