We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Vinitha Mammen a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Hi Vinitha, so great to have you on the platform. There’s so much we want to ask you, but let’s start with the topic of self-care. Do you do anything for self-care and if so, do you think it’s had a meaningful impact on your effectiveness?
I have to start by saying that I am relatively new to self care and hardly ever practiced it till a few years ago. It was when I started feeling extremely frustrated and resentful with life in general that I realized I need to start taking care of myself unapologetically. It has been a journey (and still is) because it is difficult to break a lifetime of conditioning that makes you believe that self care is selfish. But I eventually realized that you cannot pour from an empty cup. So if you truly want to be there for the people you love, caring for yourself is not just an okay thing to do, but an absolute essential practice. One of my first attempts at self-care is in fact what sparked my current full-time career as a lettering artist. I started by creating bite-sized pieces of calligraphy in a small sketchbook as a way to unwind from the pressures of coursework while I was doing my masters degree. These really helped me forget about my worries and deadlines and everything else that was stressful for those few minutes I spent drawing and writing words. Looking back, these were sloppy, unfinished and certainly not well-balanced lettering compositions. But, they served their purpose and made me wanna keep lettering, which in effect made me better at it while also being an effective form of self care.
Later on in life when I found myself feeling alone and helpless with things turning out nothing like the life I’d dreamt for myself, I started channeling these frustrations into my lettering. I started lettering quotes related to the stuff that was going on in my life and sometimes even responses I wish I had given to people who hurt me. This was cathartic. The great thing about lettering is, you can be literal about what you’re feeling. It’s words. There’s nothing abstract or interpretive that you feel pressured to come up with. You can just speak your heart out with words. And being a visual person, drawing words and getting them to look pretty was the way for me vs just writing words. Taking the time to draw them also made me spend more focussed time just soaking the words in, which helped me slow down and feel better. Lettering about my struggles and sharing them with the world made me feel less alone because I soon started to realize that there are people who resonate with exactly how I’m feeling, and by sharing my work, I was opening up channels for these people to talk about it. This is how my work evolved around creating empowering lettering. It was not something I knew I wanted to do right away, it revealed itself through what I started as a self love measure.
This eventually led me to starting a lettering challenge called I Love Me Lettering with my good friend Akanksha Shetty. As you can tell from the name, this challenge was all about self love and sprouted from our desire to give others the same gift of using lettering as a channel for self care. Several women joined in on a monthly basis and it filled our hearts to see the impact that this little brainchild of ours was having. Although we had to take a break from hosting this challenge for a while, we’re reviving it in 2024 and I’m so excited for all the lives it’s going to touch in small and big ways!
So self-love was not just a key element in helping me cope with life, but also in finding my niche within the lettering world. By creating art around my real-life struggles I was creating effective art.
I still struggle with prioritizing myself, but I’ve made so much progress and whenever I can, I try and empower others, especially other women, to also put themselves first. Unapologetically.
Great, so let’s take a few minutes and cover your story. What should folks know about you and what you do?
I am a mechanical engineer turned fashion designer turned lettering artist and illustrator. The first switch was because I figured I did not wanna spend the majority of my life doing something that I was not driven to do. The second switch, however, was a way to adapt when life threw curveballs at me and I needed to carve out a path for myself that I was happy with. This is how lettering and illustration evolved from being a hobby to being my full-time freelance career. I now get to help businesses and brands express themselves through custom illustrated projects that stand out with pretty and playful lettering, fun stylized illustrations and bold colour palettes. Apart from custom commissions, I design and paint illustrated murals for local spaces and teach lettering and illustration through in-person workshops and online on Skillshare where I’m a Top Teacher. What excites me the most about all this, is that I get to do what I love for a living. Sure it’s not a walk in the park all the time, but it’s also been a challenging. fulfilling and enriching path. Seeing my work out in the world creating impact and reading the kind reviews my students write about my classes are some of my favorite parts about my job.
My journey as a lettering artist and illustrator, just like any creative small business, is a constant work-in-progress. I always have things in my pipeline that I’m working towards, goals to crush and more ideas than I have time to execute. For example, I’m hosting a live session with Skillshare in Jan where attendees get to draw their word of the year for 2024 with me in real time on Procreate. A YouTube channel is in the works, and I’m also brainstorming more workshops for adults and children and more monthly challenges to help my community stay creative and inspired. All of the excitement happens on my instagram, so for anyone who might like to keep up with my journey, that would be the best place to connect with me and stay in the loop.
If you had to pick three qualities that are most important to develop, which three would you say matter most?
I would say proactivity, adaptability and resilience. My biggest advise to anyone who is early in their journey is to start. That there will be a time in the future when everything aligns perfectly for you to start is a myth. You have to start somewhere, so you might as well be proactive and start now. I promise you, if you start and have the determination to keep going, you will figure things out as you go. Secondly, things are going to change as you progress through your journey. The illustration industry and the modern art world in general is constantly changing, and unless you are will to adapt to the times you will be left behind. So plan ahead, but be willing to review and tweak your plans if required. And finally, The freelance illustrator’s journey is certainly full of ups and downs and unpredictability and there were definitely times when I felt like giving up. But the highs are even more rewarding than the lows are discouraging, so I continue to persist. Certainly give yourself the grace to get through the lows but find ways to pick yourself back up so that you can push forward.
Who is your ideal client or what sort of characteristics would make someone an ideal client for you?
My ideal client is someone who not only believes in women’s rights but actively seeks to contribute to making the world a better place for women. They see the importance of investing in the community and understand the impact of their choices. Additionally, they value the creative process and appreciate the work of artists, understanding that custom design is a premium investment worth making. Time is respected as a precious commodity, reflecting a commitment to efficiency and professionalism. They have impeccable taste and aesthetic sense, and find joy in vibrant colours.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.vinithamammen.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/vinithamammen/
- Other: Skillshare: https://www.skillshare.com/en/r/profile/Vinitha-Mammen/6724902?gr_tch_ref=on
