Strawberry Milkshake

Strawberry Milkshake was a character I created in 2023 as part of a small online artist adoptable* collaboration. The theme for this collaboration was drinks, & inspiration struck right away when thinking of a diner-style strawberry milkshake.

It was an obvious choice to go for an 80s diner waitress inspired character. When brainstorming, I knew my character would be wearing a waitress uniform, now it was just a matter of how to make it interesting. Obviously, to keep in theme of strawberries, I kept the colour palette to pinks & reds.

With the dress out of the way, I now focus on more visually interesting parts of the design. I thought it would be quirky to give her roller-skates instead of regular shoes, a reference to waitresses on skates.

As for the hair, I wanted to give her big curls & a fun headpiece to tie everything together. I gave her a standard waitress hat, but added a little strawberry & cookie straw.

There aren’t too many differences between my initial concept & the finished product, but I feel there are enough to talk through my process. The main component that differs is the hair. Originally, I had a lot less curls jutting out, but with later revisions, decided to go for a fuller look. Her head just looked too empty.

Strawberry Milkshake sports a pair of earrings & a few bangles in her sketch, although I opted to leave those out of the final product. There was already a lot going on on her upper area, & I felt adding more would just be overkill.

The dotted pattern you can find on her dress was an afterthought. When I finished colouring, I found her torso to be a bit lacklustre in comparison to her head. A funky pattern was not only a quirky detail to add, but it solved my problem too.

*Adoptables are characters an artist creates with the purpose to sell, allowing the buyer to “adopt” the character.