I deleted Studio Artisan Sky.
Typing that feels a little strange.
For a while, I thought having my own creative studio was where I was supposed to go next. After spending so many years working as a designer, building something of my own felt like the natural progression.
So I did.
I gave it a name. I created the identity. I built the website. I made the social media pages. I worked with clients. I tried to figure out leads, marketing, content, pricing, and all the other things that suddenly come with being a designer who also has to run a business.
Studio Artisan Sky became real.
And for a while, I was proud of that.
But somewhere along the way, I started asking myself a question I couldn't really ignore:
Do I actually want to keep doing it this way?
When creativity starts feeling
like another job
I've been a designer for around 15 years.
Creativity has been my career for most of my adult life. I create because it's my job. I solve problems because it's my job. I make things for brands, campaigns, clients, briefs, deadlines, revisions, and objectives.
Then I created Studio Artisan Sky.
And suddenly, the thing I built outside of my creative job became...
another creative job.
More briefs.
More clients.
More deadlines.
More marketing.
More pressure to post.
More pressure to find leads.
More pressure to keep something moving even when there wasn't much happening behind the scenes.
And that last part became harder than I expected.
The part nobody really sees
Running a small creative studio isn't just about doing good creative work.
You also have to constantly create opportunities for the work to exist.
There were periods when things were moving, and then periods when everything became incredibly quiet. Finding consistent projects was difficult. Leads didn't always turn into conversations. Conversations didn't always turn into projects.
And when things slowed down, I found myself spending more energy thinking about how to keep the studio alive than actually enjoying having one.
Should I post more?
Should I change how I market it?
Should I reach out to more people?
Should I offer something different?
Should I just wait?
Should I try harder?
There was this constant feeling that I should be doing something to make it work.
And I think this is something people sometimes underestimate about having a business.
Business isn't a one-way street where you put something out into the world and money simply comes back.
Before you make a profit, you have to build something worth paying for. And when you're starting from scratch, that takes time, money, energy, consistency, and a lot of work that nobody sees.
People sometimes look at having your own business as an easier way to make money, or even a shortcut to becoming rich.
It isn't.
You spend before you earn.
You invest in tools, websites, software, marketing, advertising, resources, and countless little things that add up. You invest your time too, which is probably the easiest cost to underestimate.
And there's no guarantee that spending money means you'll immediately make it back.
Sometimes you're investing while you're still trying to convince people that your business exists.
You build the portfolio.
You build the website.
You build the brand.
You build the audience.
You look for leads.
You follow up.
You market yourself.
You try something.
It doesn't work.
So you change it and try again.
And only after all of that do you hopefully start seeing the return from everything you've been putting into it.
That's what building from scratch really means.
There's nothing underneath you yet. You have to create the foundation before you can expect anything to stand on it.
I knew running a business required work, of course. But knowing something theoretically and actually experiencing it are two very different things.
The difficult part was that I already had a full-time creative career. Studio Artisan Sky existed alongside that, which meant I was essentially asking myself to finish one creative job and then immediately switch into another.
Eventually, maintaining the studio started feeling heavier than the excitement I originally had when I created it.
And I had to admit something to myself.
Maybe I didn't need to stop creating.
Maybe I just needed to change how I was doing it.
Studio Artisan Sky taught me more than I realized
Here's the funny thing about closing Studio Artisan Sky:
I'm walking away from it knowing significantly more than I did when I started.
Having a studio forced me to learn things quickly because if something needed to be done, somebody had to figure out how to do it.
A lot of the time, that somebody was me.
I learned how to create email newsletters. I learned more about building websites. I refreshed my Figma skills. I learned how to plan content calendars and manage social media beyond simply designing posts.
I built client portals.
I created presentation decks.
I developed templates and systems.
I worked through pricing strategies.
I figured out processes, workflows, documents, and all the boring little things behind the polished work people eventually see.
Some of those were things I probably wouldn't have pushed myself to learn as quickly if Studio Artisan Sky hadn't required them from me.
It forced me to become more resourceful.
When I didn't know how to do something, I had to learn.
When something didn't exist, I had to build it.
When a process wasn't working, I had to figure out another way.
And that knowledge doesn't disappear just because the studio does.
I'm taking all of it with me.
So, was Studio Artisan Sky a failure?
I don't think so.
It existed.
I built something from nothing.
I learned from it. I worked with people through it. I learned what running a creative business actually feels like instead of just romanticizing the idea of having my own studio.
And maybe most importantly, it taught me something I didn't expect:
Just because one version of something ends doesn't mean everything you built with it disappears.
The brand can disappear.
The website can disappear.
The name can disappear.
But the experience doesn't.
Neither do the skills.
I know much more now than I did when I started.
So no, I don't consider that a failure.
It was an education.
I'm back to being solo
And now I'm starting again.
On my own.
But this time, I'm not starting from zero.
That's the difference.
I'm starting with more experience, more skills, more systems, and a much clearer understanding of what it actually takes to build something.
I'm also starting with more accountability.
When I'm doing things on my own, I know exactly who is responsible when something isn't moving.
Me.
And weirdly, I like that.
If something succeeds, I know what I did to get there.
If something doesn't work, I can look at my own decisions, figure out what went wrong, change it, and try something else.
There's freedom in that.
I think this time I know what to do.
Or at least, I know far more than I did before.
I have ways now.
I have systems.
I have templates.
I have processes.
I know how to build the things I need.
And for the things I don't know, I've also learned that I don't need to become an expert at absolutely everything.
Doing it alone doesn't mean doing everything alone
One thing I want to do differently this time is recognize where my own abilities stop.
I've become pretty self-sufficient. At this point, I feel like I can navigate maybe 90% of what I need to do on my own.
But that remaining 10% matters.
Instead of forcing myself to learn absolutely everything or spending hours struggling through something that isn't my expertise, I'd rather find people who are genuinely good at the things I'm not.
People I can collaborate with when I need them.
People who can do something in an hour that might take me an entire day to figure out.
Being solo doesn't mean I have to do every single thing myself.
It means I'm responsible for knowing when I shouldn't.
That's something I understand much better now.
But I'm not looking for clients yet
This is probably the biggest difference.
I'm not rushing this time. I'm not immediately thinking about leads or how quickly I can turn what I'm building into something profitable.
I'm not even open to taking on clients right now, and that's an intentional choice.
Right now, I want to build.
I want to focus on my portfolio, experiment, explore new ideas, and create projects simply because I find them interesting, not because someone handed me a brief.
I want to step back, look at my body of work, and figure out what I actually want the next version of my creative career to look like.
For the first time in a while, I'm creating for myself again.
Clients can come later. The business side can come later.
Right now, I want to give myself the space to create, learn, and figure out where I want to go next.
For now, the work comes first.
So what now?
I don't have everything figured out.
But I don't think starting over means erasing everything and going back to zero.
Sometimes starting over means taking everything the previous version taught you and deciding to build differently.
That's where I am.
Studio Artisan Sky was part of my story.
I'm proud that I built it.
I'm grateful for everything it forced me to learn.
And I'm also comfortable admitting that this version has reached its end.
I'm back to being solo.
Except this time, I'm not the same person
who started Studio Artisan Sky.
I know more.
I can do more.
I know what I don't know.
And most importantly, I have a much better idea of what I want to build next.
For now, I'm not building another studio.