Art & Sea is an innovative company based just outside Oban, Argyll, specialising in self adhesive vinyl boat lettering, custom vinyl graphics for boats; yachts, motorboats, fishing boats, narrowboats and kayaks as well as vehicle branding and graphic design.
We pride ourselves in offering a custom design service, producing eye catching, unique designs for business and personal use. All graphics are cut in high quality marine grade vinyl making them perfect for a life at sea or on land.
Our office at Creran Marine, Barcaldine, Oban.
Originally from North Wales, I studied Art & Design for a year at Coleg Menai, specialising in Fine Art. After taking some time to travel, I returned home in 2009 and began working as a sea kayaking instructor around Oban and the surrounding area.
HOW IT ALL BEGAN
The idea behind Art & Sea first started back in 2011 when I purchased my first composite sea kayak – I wanted to make my boat unique and stand out from the rest. Internet search results were unsuccessful, so I decided to get inventive! After lots of research, I settled on vinyl as the most versatile and durable option. I sourced a vinyl supplier and ordered a couple of rolls of vinyl. Without any other equipment at the time, I cut all of the graphics out by hand and applied them individually. It was a slow but rewarding process!
It didn’t take me long to realise that there was a huge gap in the market for custom vinyl graphics and so, Art & Sea began. I spent time looking into the best equipment for my needs, put together a business plan and applied for start up funding offered by the Prince’s Scottish Youth Business Trust. My application was successful and it allowed me to purchase a vinyl cutter and some initial stock. I set up a website and the rest is history!
AND NOW
We have an office at Creran Marine, where we have everything we need to bring your ideas to life. We offer vinyl boat names and vinyl lettering, custom vinyl graphics, vehicle branding and graphic design.
No matter how big or bold your ideas, I’m here to make them work. That’s what makes Art & Sea unique; all graphics are drawn digitally by myself which means that everything is completely unique. I’ll work with you to create your vision and I absolutely love being able to bring your ideas to life.
When I’m not in the office, I can either be found on the sea (I hold the BCU’s Advanced Sea Kayak Leader and UKCC Level 2 Coach awards as well as being a volunteer crew member for Oban’s RNLI Lifeboat) or, I’ll be working on an exciting concept to challenge myself and expand our business further!
Thanks for reading,
Leonie x
My current SKUK Pilgrim covered in Puffins. Designed, produced and applied by myself.
We are keen to do everything we can to keep our carbon footprint and waste to a minimum. Although only on a small scale, every little helps, so here are some of the things we try to keep up with.
We do our best to re-use as much packaging as we can. Our vinyl deliveries arrive in cardboard boxes and bubble wrap. We reuse all of this to package your orders, any bubble wrap we don’t use is passed on to others. Vinyl itself is usually rolled on a cardboard tube, we reuse these for packaging as well. All envelopes we use are paper, and where possible we use vinyl off cuts instead of packaging tapes too.
We only print invoices when required. In all other cases we operate electronically. All our postage is processed online and only the necessary labels printed; we aren’t collecting receipts from that either. Our design work is all carried out digitally too. Anything we do print is either recycled or used to fuel our wood burner.
We regret that vinyl itself and its backing paper aren’t yet recyclable. We hope in time they will be, but in the meantime we collect as much of the offcuts that we can’t use as possible, box them up and give them away to anyone that can make use of them – school projects, home crafts etc. We’ve also discovered it makes a great alternative to parcel tape and we now use vinyl off cuts to package our parcels instead.
We always use the highest quality vinyls we are able to. This means that our graphics should last at least 5 years in an external environment; cutting down the amount of times you need to replace them.
© ART & SEA 2023
