The illustration startup

Blush

2020–2022Co-founder · Head of design · Some of the artblush.design ↗

Illustrations for everyone.

By artists everywhere. Blush was the startup I co-founded: a place where illustrators publish collections and anyone can remix them, right inside Figma.

I'd been drawing free illustration packs for years and watching people use them everywhere. The problem was always the same: you liked the style but you wanted a different pose, different colors, different everything. So you either learned to draw or you gave up.

Blush was the fix. Artists publish customizable collections, and you remix them right where you already work. No downloading a zip and cracking open Illustrator. Just pick a person, swap the hair, change the palette, drop it in.

Illustrations for everyone, by artists everywhere

The remix

Customizable, not just downloadable

The whole idea lived in one interaction: you grab an illustration and it isn't a flat file, it's a set of choices. Skin tone, hair, expression, outfit, background. Every collection is a little wardrobe the artist drew, and you play dress-up until it looks like your thing.

Remixing a collection in motion.

Inside Figma

We built it as a Figma plugin because that's where the work happens. You never leave the file. Pick a style, tweak it, drop it on the canvas. It felt less like a stock site and more like a coloring book that lived inside your design tool.

The artists

The part I'm proudest of isn't the tech. It's that Blush was a place for other illustrators. Artists published their own collections, kept their own style, and got paid when people used their work. My drawings were just some of the drawings. That was always the point.

An artist page. Each illustrator brought their own world.