A 52-year-old woman has described how she grew her idea from a small start-up to a popular £1million business. Bonny Snowdon, from Yorkshire, is a mum-of-three and became a professional animal portrait artist in her mid-40s, despite having not drawn since her school days.
The endeavour was sparked when Ms Snowdon’s daughter purchased her a colouring book and pencils in 2016, to start as a hobby.
But soon enough, the Ripon-based mum was succeeding in her fledgling business, which she is now taking to new heights.
Ms Snowdon left school at the age of 15, beginning her working life as a tea lady in an advertising agency, and later became a business coach.
But despite the success she now enjoys, life hasn’t always been optimistic for the artist.
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Ms Snowdon had a battle with mental abuse during her 19-year marriage, after her husband struggled with depression following the death of his father.
She explained: “I lived on eggshells for years not knowing when he was going to blow up.
“It got to the point where I was scared of talking about certain subjects, money was the main one, I could never talk about it and that’s the main reason I got into debt.
“I was too frightened to talk to him about needing to pay off a phone bill, that I ended up taking out credit cards and over time, the debt ballooned to over £22,000.”
Although her partner later left the family home, it was at this point Ms Snowdon became worried about her future.
She continued: “When he moved out, we discussed putting the family home up for sale, but I had nowhere to live and I had three teenage children and my three dogs. I remember being so worried about trying to find a rental property that would fit us all and take the dogs.
“I had just become a full-time artist and was not earning a huge amount of money then and had no real way of taking a mortgage on myself and paying him half the house.
“I was looking at rental properties which were going to cost more than the mortgage, and they didn’t take dogs. I can remember feeling sick all the time, trying to be okay for the children and run my then very new business.”
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However, Ms Snowdon was determined to succeed and over time, she established two successful businesses.
The first is Bonny Snowdon Fine Art, where she specialises in creating hyper-realistic pet portraits for animal lovers.
She has since launched the Bonny Snowdon Academy, an online teaching platform for budding colouring pencil artists.
At present, she reaches 2,500 members, mainly women aged 45 and over across the UK, how to create lifelike drawings of their favourite animals.
Ms Snowdon runs her businesses with a team of three people, but this has not hampered her success.
In 2023, she expects her two companies to turn over a combined £1million, up from £450,000 in 2022.
The artist said: “Creativity is a portal to another world. It allows us to disappear from our everyday life – and if you don’t lead a very nice life that is just the most amazing thing. It quietens the mind – busy hands, quiet mind is the saying and it’s so true. Creativity in any form is in my opinion essential for healthy minds.
“I know myself how helpful it was, disappearing for hours with my colouring book.”
Ms Snowdon’s story may inspire those who are looking to turn a hobby into a side hustle or a full-time business.
The artist stressed it was her struggle to survive which gave her more impetus to make her business a success.
For further information about Bonny Snowdon and her work, visit: www.bonnysnowdonacademy.com and www.bonnysnowdonfine art.co.uk.
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