About our Art

Today I want to introduce you to my friend @rachelrogersdesign. I met Rachel when our firstborns went to daycare together. They were baby bffs and had the most adorable relationship. During the pandemic, they had toddler FaceTime dates and showed each other stuffies and giggled on camera. Eventually, we caved and let them play together on beach dates. Her family was a lifeline that year.

We expanded from mom friends into business partnerships through a brand I used to work on. Working with her was a joy, and everything she made was breathtakingly beautiful. I had longed for a new project to collaborate on, and I did not dream it would be one so close to my heart. 

In casual conversation with Rachel I talked about my new Brazilian project, and mentioned Farm Rio and how happy the prints made me. Rachel had been expressing her own art through patterns in the form of decoupage, making custom frames out of tissue paper she had patterned. We then decided to collaborate on a pattern as the starting point for The Carioca Kitchen.

A pile of dusty papers and photographs had sat in a suitcase since I had come home from my last trip to see my dad over a year prior. I decided it was time to face them, and sent Rachel everything from old photos to marital certificates to letters between my mom and dad. Almost all elements of this pattern were pulled from these, including my grandmother’s passport photo, +++ signs that my mom and dad added to love letters to each other, an old logo from my mom’s first jewelry business, stamps, fingerprints, and everything you see here. 

My eyes welled up when I first saw the pattern. There were many things that had moved me to start this project, but this was the first time it actually came to life.

Rachel does all of our postcard art and is currently working on some Rio watercolor paintings for the shop in 2024. We are so excited for what’s to come next year, and we are so grateful for deep, meaningful collaborations like this one!