A career, drawn into one frame
Fifteen years at one company is a lot of picture: the first desk, the product everyone remembers, the two colleagues who were there for all of it, the deal on the napkin. A career journey illustration puts it in one frame, built from the stories rather than the CV.
What a career portrait includes
Concrete things. The first office and the last one. The project that took a year and the phrase they said through all of it. The colleague who started the same week. The object on their desk that nobody else was allowed to touch. The thing they are going to do next.
The interview asks for each of those in turn, in plain questions, for about ten minutes. You answer in your own words. The answers become the brief the portrait is built from, and the details in that brief are what people recognise when they open it.
How a long career becomes one image
It does not have to be a timeline. Fifteen years laid out left to right reads like a chart. What works better is one scene with the years folded into it: the person at the centre, and around them the objects, places and people that carried the story, so the eye finds one detail after another.
That means choosing. A portrait that tries to include every year becomes a poster, so the studio picks the strongest combination from what you told us. Some things will not appear, and that editing is part of the craft. If a specific product, logo or office matters, a reference photo is the only way to get the real thing rather than our interpretation of it.
One example, from a made-up career
From the interview
Thirty years in sales, for Rob
- His biggest deal was sketched on a restaurant napkin. It has hung framed in his office ever since.
- When Rob is closing, his voice drops an octave and the whole floor goes quiet to listen.
- The bottom drawer holds one very good Burgundy, strictly 'for emergencies only'.
Rob is a fictional person we invented to show the process. The photo is a model image and the interview was written by us; no real customer's story appears on this page.
What to bring
One clear photo of their face, and two or three of their world: the desk, the gear, the things everyone associates with them. If a particular office, product or logo has to be right, a photo of it.
Two or three specific stories from the years. The ones colleagues still tell are the ones to bring. If several people worked alongside them, ask each for a line or two and paste the replies in at the start of the interview, untidied.
Questions people ask about career illustrations
Can it cover 15 or 30 years?
Yes. Length is not the problem; choosing is. The interview draws out the moments that defined the years, and the studio composes one scene from the strongest of them. Thirty years and fifteen come out the same size: one portrait, one frame.
Does it have to be a timeline shape?
No, and usually it is better when it is not. One scene with the years folded into it reads as a portrait of a person; a left-to-right strip reads as a chart. If you want the timeline shape, say so in the interview and we will work with it.
Can you include company logos or products?
Yes, with a reference photo. Anything we have a photo of is painted from the real thing. Anything we do not have a photo of is painted from our interpretation, and for a specific brand, product or logo that is rarely close enough. The interview tells you which items have a reference and which do not before anything is made.
Can we include several colleagues?
A team photo can be painted into the scene as a picture within the picture: a framed photo on the desk, a snapshot pinned to the wall. The same people, the same poses, in the portrait's style. The portrait itself stays about one person.
Is this the same as a farewell gift?
Often it is the same purchase. A career illustration is the format; the farewell, retirement or work anniversary is the occasion. If someone is leaving, the farewell gifts page covers the date and the group side of it.
An honest note
Your piece is created with the help of AI image generation, directed by us. You tell us the story in a guided interview; we turn what you said into a detailed brief, and that brief is what drives the image. Then a person looks at what came out and decides whether it is good enough to send you. Most first attempts are not.
The AI is the brush. The story is yours, and the judgement about whether it is any good is ours.
One portrait, €48
Order, and we send you a private link to the interview. Ten minutes of your time, then your piece within 48 hours.
Start a portrait — €48