Hello, and welcome! I’m Heidi Helm.
You’ve found my website, where I post new designs and collections for my surface design business.
I have always loved making things. My Nanny Brenda was a seamstress by trade and taught me to knit and hand-sew when I was 4. Not long after that, my Mum taught me to sew with her machine. Mum was super crafty and was always creating holiday decorations, and sewing me and my siblings costumes and clothes. When she got a new machine, I got her old Singer. It lived in an open-up table that stored the machine underneath. Soon, I was sewing my own clothes and costumes.
With the advent and affordability of print-on-demand, designing my own fabric patterns feels a like a miracle on the order of the fishes and the loaves. It’s unlimited. All potential, just waiting to happen. Anything I can imagine, can now become a reality.
I mostly hand draw the elements of my designs in Procreate. I use Illustrator for more precise spacing and shapes. I’ve put in a fair number of hours, analog doodling, which naturally shows up in my patterns. I just adore the Mid Century Modern look and feel. Scandinavian Folk Art. Bauhaus. I love Helvetica and the other fonts designed during that era. The art in children’s books from the 1950s and ‘60s. The messy pattern overlays and the dated color palates. Love!
I very nearly went into fashion design in college, and at the last minute chose fine art instead. At some point I saw teaching or starving as my only career options and veered off the path. Not long after that, I decided to pursue graphic design and returned to school, attending a small, two-year art college in Cincinnati, where I live. I got the opportunity to be in some of the very first classes teaching computer graphics—learning programs that don’t even exist anymore.
Since that time, I’ve consistently free-lanced as a designer, and occasionally held traditional jobs doing the same (and other random things). But, always, I still felt like I wasn’t a real artist. And, I didn’t know if I ever would be. Artists make art, right? And I wasn’t doing that consistently. I missed it, but couldn’t seem to find my way back.
I returned to school again, and finished my undergraduate degree, in leadership and organizations, to which I was introduced by a mentor in the same field. Making a living as an artist still felt far off, and I loved the idea of analyzing and working with organizations to be more healthy. Because of my interest in psychology, philosophy and social sciences, I was led to a masters program in Integral Theory (mapping the integration of art and science) with a focus on human development. My design background, experience with web design, and penchant for tech, ultimately landed me in the online, self-development-course world, where I quite happily worked remotely since 2011.
After COVID, people seemed less inclined to take online courses and I found less and less work coming my way. Around that time, I discovered Spoonflower’s print on demand site and designed my first pattern, meant for a redecorating project—my own living room. I soon found myself firmly in the world of surface design. I could not have arranged my path here with more efficiency or alacrity. All my experience and skill and talent align perfectly. I consistently find myself in a state of flow and satisfaction, exploring new ideas for patterns. And then creating complementary patterns to accompany. The possibilities are quite literally without limit!
I started entering the design challenges on the Spoonflower site and quickly gained confidence and experience in this aspect of design. My design path over the past 30+ years has afforded me well over my 10,000 hours of practice and I’m so grateful to have found this outlet for my art—to make art again—to be an artist.