Sleepless Muse is my largest personal project to date — an eCommerce apparel brand based on my own illustration work. Being a solo venture, I’ve been responsible for product design and development. I also handle brand design, social media management, and email marketing. Additionally, I manage photography, web design, and customer service.
I began the work in January 2024, opting for an Etsy shop using Printful as my production partner. This approach enabled me to market test products. I could explore trends and see which of my designs performed the best, while spending little of my own budget. Each month the shop regularly received Etsy’s customer service badges for high review ratings and speedy response times. Eventually the shop earned the coveted Star Seller status.
Brand Design
My approach to developing the brand guidelines for Sleepless Muse was a months-long process. It was experimental and took place alongside the design of individual products. From the beginning I knew I wanted to incorporate visuals from my illustration work, which usually involves a lot of detailed, intricate linework. Early concepts involved blue and black as the main brand colors. This choice aimed for a night-themed aesthetic, which seemed logical for the “Sleepless” part of the brand name.
However, I felt that this wasn’t really authentic to my own personal preference for bold, bright colors in my artwork. Over the course of the spring and summer, I created several collections from some of my illustrations. This is around when the brand’s real style and aesthetic began to emerge.
Ultimately the brand colors and assets I ended up choosing were of a much more lively, maximalist approach. I chose Golden Styled Regular as the logo typeface, as well as Century Gothic and Montserrat Classic for header and body fonts. I felt that Golden Styled’s swooping, stylized serifs contrasted well with the simple sans serif fonts. I also felt it was important that the brand’s typography remain simple. In this manner it doesn’t compete with the frenetic, “kitchen sink” style of the imagery.
Web Design
In the fall of 2024 I began building the website for the shop. Initially I tried out Square as a hosting platform, due to its simplicity and ease of use. But ultimately I decided to go with Shopify, the gold standard for eCommerce business. The website itself is fast, responsive, user-friendly, and SSL certified. See more at sleeplessmuse.com.
