Meet Lulu: My First Custom Character

In last week’s The Creation of Menomorphia: A Fairy Tale, I introduced you to my character, Lulu.

Today, I want to share who Lulu is, and how she came to be.

Here’s Lulu’s first appearance as a character, it’s the year I decided to take art seriously and set my first annual art intentions.

If you look closely at the bottom row, you’ll see one that says “Design Characters”.

Why create custom characters?

Because characters let me tell stories. They let me build worlds.

Stories endure. A good story can touch someone’s soul and transform an artwork (or blog post, or video) into an experience.

That’s how I want to show up in the world: not just making art, but creating memories, sparking wonder, and leaving people better than I found them.

Lulu didn’t appear out of nowhere. She was always inside me.

Her name has roots in my personal story.

When my husband first learned my middle name was Louise, he started calling me “Donna Lu,” which eventually became just “Lu.” Later, when we were apart in a long-distance relationship, he sent me a giant Vermont Teddy Bear with “Lulu” embroidered on its foot. It was a gift of safety and comfort for my inner child. And in that moment, the concept of Lulu was born.

Over the years Lulu became my shorthand for holding onto a childlike sense of wonder, to staying open and curious and kind to myself. In fact she's filled a lot of roles in my life. Through Lulu I’ve become my own mother, sister, daughter and best friend. She is who I am/was and want(ed) to be.

So when it came time to design her, the choices were easy.

Of course she had purple hair—huge, anime-style purple hair! I dressed her in a purple overall dress with a long sleeved pink shirt, echoing the apron and shirts I often wear when painting.

She appears on this page in three different roles.

She’s there in the top row playing with blocks, representing my inner child and the goal “play more”. This is the first time I’m starting to use Lulu as a tool to help me remember my goals. The presence of Lulu from that moment forward represents to me that I want to play, have fun, and keep my mind and eyes open.

In the “Design Characters” block she’s there as an illustration of the action of designing characters reminding me of the desire to have fun with it, and she’s also there as my first steps to move this intention to do into doing.

That was the beginning of character design for me. Rather than sit down and try to flesh out every detail and nuance (which quickly becomes overwhelming), I started making and writing down decisions. I can always change them 🙂

Lulu does change often, both as my skills improve and as I need her to play new roles. In my short story, for example, Lulu was an adult. She was still being childlike and open, but sharing adult vulnerabilities and feelings.

In the same month I set these goals, I started a new sketchbook. I put Lulu on the front page as a reminder to have fun.

I had just heard about urban sketching and hadn’t tried it yet “in the wild”, and I was a bit nervous about doing it. I’d watched about 100 hours of sketchers on YouTube, and I’d tried it at home from photos, but I hadn’t drawn in public.

I was going on a cruise, and this sketchbook would be my first travel sketchbook as well as first urban sketching experiences. So I brought Lulu along on this first page, as a reminder to not take myself too seriously.

Sketching in public is scary. You feel judged. You ARE judged. And Lulu reminded me that when it comes to art I’m only a child. Sometimes children are fearless. It worked like magic.

Here is tour of that sketchbook...

Since then, I start every sketchbook, journal or bujo now with Lulu and this message
“If you’ve found this I’ve lost it and I’m devastated! Please help me by returning it to me?"

Next week I'll share how Lulu helped me achieve a goal I'd attempted four times before!