From Grieving to Greatness

An Unexpected Adventure

The Moment. The Reason.

My journey didn’t start in a makeup school. It started in a hospice. I was twenty-one when we lost our dad, and I didn't have the tools to deal with it. Nobody had really given me any. What I had were books, fantasy books, specifically, and I disappeared into them completely. Other worlds, other realms, carefully built narratives that felt so real I could sense them. I didn't just read them. I lived in them for a while. They genuinely pulled me through a very dark time.

I didn't know it then, but that need - to escape into something magical, to believe in another world entirely, became the entire foundation of everything I'd go on to build.

A man lying in bed with two children, a girl on his left and a boy on his right, all smiling for a selfie.

"That need - to escape into something magical, became the entire foundation of what I'd go on to build"

Finding the Path

I wanted to give something back to the hospice that had cared for my dad. I asked if I could help with their fundraising. Then asked again. Then basically pleaded. Eventually they said they could use a face painter at their next event.

I'd never face painted in my life.

Terrified but determined, I said yes.

I remember being so nervous standing there with paints I'd never used, waiting for the first little face to sit in front of me. But something happened that day that I can only describe as recognition — like meeting a part of yourself you didn't know was missing. I’d only ever really been good at art, school was definitely not my thing, and I’d finally found a skill I could use. I was completely smitten from that very first event.

A young girl with a pink dress is sitting on an orange stool, having her face painted by a woman wearing a flower crown, gold sequined jacket, and colorful skirt at an outdoor event with tents and trees.

"But something happened that day I can only describe as recognition - like meeting a part of yourself you didn't know was missing."

Living for the Yeses

Face painting led to festivals. Festivals led to me meeting a pro body painter from London who gave me the encouragement I needed to pursue this as a career. This new dream led me to New Zealand because why not! I have always, always been obsessed with Lord of the Rings, and if I was going to go anywhere, it was going to be there.

I spent six months exploring the country in a van older than me, then moved to Auckland to become “a face painterrr”. I was painting at a kindergarten for a dollar a face, handing out handwritten business cards, (looking back I absolutely cringe! but I guess it’s kinda sweet) when this wonderful woman watched me work and hired me on the spot as her assistant in the Wigs, Hair and Makeup department for the New Zealand Opera.

I told her I had no experience whatsoever.

She said I’d be fine and she’d teach me on the job.

I said ‘absolutely yes’.

And that, folks, is how I got my first professional job in the creative industry. Putting myself out there, right time, right place, right person.

Three young girls with colorful face paint and makeup, making silly faces.

Woman smiling and holding a decorated cake with a house and smiling yellow objects.

Three smiling women standing outdoors in front of the Hobbit house from Bilbo Bott's House, an earth-covered home with a round door, surrounded by colorful flowers and greenery.

"And that, is how I got my first professional job in the creative industry. Putting myself out there, right time, right place, right person."

Doing It Anyway

New Zealand introduced me to Yolanda Bartrum — multi award-winning and world-champion body and SFX artist, co-founder of BodyFX, and someone who would end up shaping my early career substantially.

I attended her course. On the morning of day two, she pulled me to one side. My stomach dropped! I was convinced I'd done something wrong. Instead, she told me someone had called in sick and she wanted me to cover the job.

I became one of her artists. Then also her studio assistant, working on incredible special FX and prosthetics projects, learning about products, techniques, skills, meeting people from film and TV. As an employee I could attend any course she ran for free. I did every single one. Zombies. SFX. Airbrushing. Body art. If it was running, I was on it.

This is where I first truly understood the scope of what this world could be. Where I realised that these skills — my skills — could bring the fantasy I'd so desperately needed just 3 years earlier to tangible, believable life.

Person dressed as a fantasy creature with red, black, and white body paint, wearing a puppet mask with horns, sharp teeth, and long dark hair, standing outdoors among greenery.

Person with face painted as a dog, large pink flower and green leaves in hair, blonde hair, tattoo on shoulder, neutral expression.

A woman with burn scars on her face, neck, and shoulder, looking at the camera with a neutral expression.

A person with a shaved head, wearing a yellow sports jersey, has a realistic artificial injury on their scalp with a wound, exposed tissue, and blood.

"This is where I realised that my skills could bring the fantasy I'd needed... to life"

Comfort Zone? Hardly Know ‘er!

I moved back to the UK in 2016, to Bristol, alone, and started Painted Peach and my new life, from scratch.

What followed was years of building — my business, my clients, my reputation, more prosthetics courses, more SFX training, several business courses, more yeses to things that made my heart race. Immersive theatre. Events. Music videos. Photoshoots. I just kept saying yes before feeling ready and it does eventually start feeling less intimidating. I built a strong network of creative friends, I finally found my people! And I’ve never felt more at home, anywhere.

Then lockdown arrived and dismantled everything, as it did for so many of us. But in that strange, quiet pause I made what turned out to be one of the best decisions of my life. I enrolled on Peter Swords King's media hair and makeup course — intensive nineteen weeks, in-industry tutors, covering everything from period hair to creature creations.

Peter Swords King, if you don't know the name, is the Oscar-winning makeup designer behind the Lord of the Rings films. For someone who had moved to New Zealand largely because of those films and my love of travel, it felt like the universe was having a little moment.

Something shifted during that course. Not just in my skills (though those grew enormously) but in my confidence and myself as a person. I started to understand that the breadth of what I'd built. Fellow artists who were so far ahead of me when I started out, were now coming to me for advice; which courses to take, which products to use, how to approach certain techniques. People I admired were telling me they couldn't believe how far I'd come.

I'm not sure I'd have believed it myself, a few years earlier. But I'd done the work. All of it. Every scary yes, every course, every odd job along the way and every job I didn’t feel ready for. It was all starting to make sense.

Two smiling young women with bald heads sit close together in a bright, decorated indoor space. One wears a multicolored geometric patterned jacket, and the other a black jacket with large white polka dots. The background features photos on the wall and windows letting in natural light.

A woman applying special effects makeup with a lion face mask on a reclining woman in a makeup studio.

A woman wearing a face shield and a black mask is applying makeup or grooming a man's eyebrows. The man has a long white beard, curly hair, and is wearing a black smock with white polka dots. They are indoors in a bright room with large windows, a television in the background, and other people faintly visible.

Oh No She Didn't!

In December ‘24, some friends from Canada came to visit and we went to Warner Bros Studio Tour. As we were in the Creature FX department, I felt what I can only describe as sadness, which I found curious. I sat with myself a few days later and delved into these feelings. About 5 hours and half a notebook full of scribbles later, I realised with no doubt in my mind, I wanted to rejoin the film industry and work in prosthetics and Creature FX. I kid you not, within under a month of setting the intention (and lots of scheming), I was working at Warner Bros Studios doing prosthetics.

After a glorious 3 months working with the most incredible team, I went to work in TV on The Witcher, Star Wars and lo and behold, Lord of the Rings! Honestly most of last year was a full pinch me moment, I still can’t quite believe it.

To everyone I’ve worked with, took a chance on me, spurred me on, believed in me, and to myself for continually saying yes and doing it despite the fear, I am so grateful. I can’t tell you how many times I looked around last year and thought “how is this actually my life”. I don’t think I ever really allowed myself to believe that I could do it, you know? Like other people could, but me? With my once handwritten business cards and relentless brain natter? Me? Surely not.

But I did. It is possible. You can fail at a job you don't want to do, so you should probably try and do the thing you really want to do, right? It’s okay to dream. And you’re allowed to fail.

"But I'd done the work. All of it. Every scared 'yes', every course,

 every job I didn’t feel ready for, and it was all starting to make sense."

A person with curly, blonde hair holding a short-term production pass badge with a smile.

"You can fail at a job you don't want to do, so you should probably try and do the thing you actually want to do, right?"

OMG, Now What?!

Well, we accidentally got a puppy in December ‘25! We fostered a rescue, we failed, we adopted her in January, we’re obsessed. Sometimes failing is the best thing that could ever happen. So now I’m a puppy momma!

The 16+ hour days in film last year left me very burnt-out and I’ve taken this year a lot easier so far, trying to recover. A few big but local commercials and jobs and it’s been a welcome change of pace, for now!

Now, as you’ve read this far (omgosh thank you for your time!) I’ll share with you my life goal! As much as I love what I do, and I really love it, there’s an even greater version of this story I’m working towards. My goal for years has been to own land. I crave a space to create, to live and to breathe, to get back to our roots of living in nature, with friends, growing veg, sharing meals, building a dream, and I need alpacas in this dream! Alongside my endless network of highly talented friends, we’ll host mindfully crafted creative retreats for people experiencing burnout — a space where people can reset and recoup, rediscover their joy.

I also aim to finally bring to life the immersive dining events I've been planning for years: carefully curated dinners with chefs who treat their plates as works of art, with farm to table food, where the waiting staff and performers are all fantasy creatures and characters designed and made by me. Where lighting, soundscapes, decor, flavour and narrative all meld together into something that engages every single sense. Soft and thoughtful and magic. The kind of evening that leaves you with memories you'll think about for the rest of your life.

I've chased funding for that vision more times than I can count. It hasn't happened yet which has been crushing. But I've also learned, over the course of this entire unexpected adventure, that through perseverance, intention, trust and the right people, these things will play out in due course when the time is right.

If you're building a world and you need someone who genuinely cares about bringing it to life, I'd love to hear about it.