Custom line portraits

Each portrait is fully customised to capture you and your loved ones. It can be whatever you’d like it to be: a family portrait that will become an heirloom, a unique and thoughtful wedding portrait as a gift, or celebrate a divorce with a beautiful illustration of just you. Your friends, family, pets, and special events or milestones turned into a special art piece created just for you.

How this works:

The basic portrait price of R5,000 includes a 45x45cm signed, unique, detailed line portrait featuring one subject with foliage or a pattern of your choice, as well as local SA shipping. Overseas shipping is available, please get in touch for a quote.

You’ll find a list below of available additions and their costs, where applicable.

To order your portrait, you can purchase the base portrait here. Once you’ve made your purchase, I will be in touch to arrange a consultation to discuss your custom commission. I will then invoice you for the outstanding amount based on your additions as listed below.

Alternatively, you can schedule a free, no-pressure, and no-obligation consultation with me to address any questions, explore options, and create a custom portrait tailored to your needs and budget. You can register here, and once you’ve registered, I’ll be in touch to set up our consult: https://www.karenvermeulen.com/product/free-15-min-commission-consult/

 

Build your own portrait:

• You can add your mom, dad, friend, partner or children at R750 per person.

• Add your cats, dogs, birds, bunnies or even your fish at R350 per pet.

• Choose your own colours.

• Choose the foliage that frames your portrait, ie it could be your houseplants or garden, wedding flowers or something from the area you live in, for example, Western Cape fynbos.

• Choose what you wear in the portrait, ie, your favourite earrings, t-shirt, a graduation gown, your Louboutin heels or a ballet costume.

• You can add accessories such as your kids’ beloved teddy, a book, your dog’s favourite toy, a musical instrument or knitting at R250 per addition.

• You can add metallic details from R150 for something small and simple, like gold wedding bands, or silver pet tag, or if you want more sparkly, R300 for, for example, a sparkly dress and jewellery, or you can go full sparkle for R950, which gets you a magical sparkly garden and as much sparkly jewellery and clothes as your heart desires. (Personally, I am a magpie and I love anything shiny!)

• You can get additional fine art prints at R600 each. Perfect for grandparents who would love to have a copy of your family portrait or to keep as heirlooms for your kids. They are available in 25x25cm at R350 or 45x45cm at R600.

• If you need it yesterday, you have a birthday or wedding looming, and you may have left it too late, my schedule permitting, I can give up my evenings, nights, and weekends to get you your portrait in time for an additional R2500.

• If you’d like something not mentioned or don’t know what you want or are unclear on something, please feel free to book that free consultation or get in touch at: hello@karenvermeulen.com

Important info:

This style of portrait was created by me and is completely original and owned by me. It is illegal to copy the style, duplicate, use AI, or in any way recreate it.

It is also prohibited to make and sell copies in any form. If you’d like additional copies or would like it printed on stickers or totebags or anything like that please get in touch with me.

Portraits are drawn by hand with an Apple Pencil in Procreate on my iPad. It is the same as drawing with a pen on paper; no AI or any digital shortcuts are involved. Each stroke is done by hand, and since it is in Procreate, I can tell you that my most recent portrait took a whopping 21,437 pencil strokes and 17 and a half hours to complete. The reason I work digitally is that traditional pen and paper drawing, editing and refining a portrait uses stacks of paper and every mistake or slip of the hand means a complete redraw once I’m drawing in pen which can double the time the illustration takes. Which means that if I worked traditionally, your portrait would cost a lot more. Doing it digitally enables me to make it more affordable. There is a reason portraits used to be reserved only for royals and the super wealthy.

But, rest assured that your portrait drawn with an Apple pencil is very much an original, authentic work of art created by me and is printed on beautiful Archival Fine Art paper with Archival inks by a specialised printer and that the piece of art you will hold in your hands will feel and look like a traditional piece of fine art and it won’t fade with time. It is a high-end product that will look and feel as if it were drawn by hand on luxury paper.

If you are unsure, you can arrange for a sample; just get in touch.

If you’d like a hand-drawn portrait, an original pen-on-paper illustration, I’d be very happy to do that for you at an extra cost. 

Once I have all the information and photos I need from you, please allow between 2 and 6 weeks for drawing, printing, and shipping.

One set of changes is included; thereafter, changes are charged at R750/hour.

Additions and their costs are dependent on what exactly those additions are. Costs are based on my drawing time, and portraits can take anything between 12 and 25 hours, depending on the level of detail and planning. Some requests might incur an additional cost. For example, a group of 6 adults will require more time than it costs for the above list, as it will require more planning, a redesign of the format, and a landscape print as opposed to a square print. However, all additions and their associated costs will be discussed and agreed upon upfront during our consultation.

Happy to ship overseas, just get in touch for a quote.