Life as a London Fashion Illustrator: How a Lisbon Holiday Led to a Illustrated Beauty Campaign

Blog by London Fashion Illustrator Elyse Blackshaw

I’ve been building my career as a London fashion illustrator for 10+ years, working across live events, brand collaborations and hand‑drawn fashion storytelling. Every so often, a project arrives that confirms putting your fun ideas and artwork into the world can open unexpected doors. This is a little story of how a few holiday drawings on my iPad led to a collaboration with Sarah Creal for their UK & Ireland launch campaign with Space NK.

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How It Started: Spontaneous Travel Sketches in Lisbon

If you have been following my work for a while, you may already know that I don’t usually work digitally, My practice has always been rooted in hand‑drawn, expressive mark‑making, using mixed-media drawing materials. I find when I travel, carrying an iPad is simply easier than packing my pens and paper - especially as I prefer to work A3. During a trip to Lisbon with some friends, I began playing around and layering my illustrations over photographs of the city. With digital illustrations, I want them to somewhat mimic the way I might draw on paper. I use simple brushes, and embody movement. It was playful, instinctive, and not something I expected to become part of my professional portfolio. With most of my experimentation, I shared a few of these travel illustrations online. Nothing strategic, just a way of documenting the trip and sharing fun ideas.

Those images quietly circulated, and I moved on to other projects back in London and Manchester.

A Year Later: Sarah Creal Reached Out...

At least a year passed before those Lisbon sketches found their way to the team at Sarah Creal. They connected with the layered, playful quality of the illustrations, and the way fashion illustrations interacted with real life environments. From there, the collaboration grew into a series of bespoke digital illustrations for their UK and Ireland launch campaign. This time, the scenes shifted from Lisbon to London from iconic landmarks to familiar streets. The illustrations were used across their social and digital channels as they launched with Space NK, blending fashion, beauty and place in a way that felt personal and relatable.

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Working Digitally

Although digital illustration isn’t my main medium, I enjoy the flexibility it offers when travelling or working on projects where there may editing required in a short space of time. My core practice remains rooted in traditional fashion illustration such as expressive lines, layered textures, and the immediacy of drawing by hand. Yet projects like this remind me that digital tools can support flexibility whilst still maintaining my own qualities and characteristics. I love seeing how the layering with photography brings to life the figures and how little stories emerge.

The story of the campaign is a fashionable Sarah Creal woman running around London to her favourite spots. Think picking up new sunglasses from Jacques Marie Mage before grabbing a cab and popping to Chelsea Physic Garden for a pot of tea in the sunshine. Or waking up and starting the day at Re:Mind Studio, followed by an afternoon at Alison Jaques Gallery and a cocktail at Vault at the Twenty Two.

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I love that a little trip to Lisbon and some playful iPad experiments led to such a wonderful campaign.

For any aspiring fashion illustrators out there, this is your sign to be confident, present and put your artwork into the world!

If you are planning an event or campaign, this is your sign to get in touch and utilise fashion illustration! You can get in touch at info@elyseblackshaw.com

If you are reading this and non of the above apply - thank you so much for taking the time to support my work!

Elyse xxx