Lizy Del BustoSelf-initiated brand concept · Retail illustration
Dr. Martens Retail Mural Concept
A self-initiated illustration concept imagining my work at large scale inside a Dr. Martens retail space.
Project details
This project started as an act of manifestation. Instead of waiting for the kind of dream collaboration I would love to work on one day, I decided to create it myself.
I’ve always loved Dr. Martens and felt that its bold, rebellious visual world could be a natural match for my illustration style. So I imagined what a large-scale illustrated mural could look like inside one of its retail spaces.
The idea
The goal was to create something that could feel at home in the Dr. Martens universe without simply reproducing the brand’s existing visuals.
I built the composition around recognizable objects connected to the brand and its culture: boots, shoes, bags, laces and accessories, mixed with playful shapes and unexpected details from my own illustration language.
Building the visual world
I started sketching different ways the objects could move around the wall. I wanted it to feel busy and playful, but not so crowded that everything disappeared into each other.
The boots and accessories gave me the starting point, and from there I played with scale, colour and little details until the whole thing started to feel like one illustration.
From illustration to wall
Once the composition was working, I started testing colour and imagining how it would feel at a much bigger scale.
I first tried a palette that was much closer to the classic Dr. Martens colours, with more black and yellow. It connected more directly to the brand, but I felt like I was losing the colourful part of my own illustration style.
So I went back to the softer pink, yellow and warmer tones. It still has little references to the Dr. Martens palette, but it feels much more like my work, and that was the version I wanted to keep.