I was contact to make a mural for the second store of Fresh Ideas Start Here (or F.I.S.H for short), located in Kitsilano, British Columbia. As their name suggests, they focus on quality sea food and, among other fishes, sea urchin roe can be found when in season.
After communicating with F.I.S.H. and establishing the style and subject matter (see: sea urchins), I sketched out variations of the wall layout based on measurements from their shop.
After drawing pencil roughs (to communicate the style of the simplified patterns), I laid out the final images onto a concrete layout of the F.I.S.H. shop wall.
Using the measuring tools available in Photoshop, I reached an idea of how much surface area I would be painting over. This helped with estimate time and material needs.
Some of the layout variations of the mural, taking into account the shelves and lighting that would block the images, in a vauge proportion to the actual wall.
The decided design, with chosen sea urchin designs plotted along the wall for the customer to enter the store right (smallest) to left (grand size).
The sketch, at proportionate scale, with sizes of each piece of the mural measured to estimate time needed.
To get a more precise idea of the time it would take to paint the entire mural, I painted a sample at a smaller scale onto newsprint paper. For each variety of sea urchin, I adjusted the time based on complexity against this in-studio test.
TIP: Paint with the colours you intend to actually use. The final, purple wall was much darker than I expected, which required extra layers of white for a solid finish.
White chalk patterns marking the final designs on the F.I.S.H. Kitsilano walls.
Marking out, painting and cleaning the final mural.
The view out of the front windows, showing the detail on the large, lower sea urchin,
FreshIdeaStartHere Instagram posts featuring the mural :)