Across Rainbows asked for a new set of illustrated promotional material for Mary O'Kart, who currently has a Friday residency at Arcobaleno. They wanted something fun and playful that took inspiration from the same thing that inspired Mary's drag name (a certain well-known fictional plumber).

Doing a little bit of research, I found that Princess Peach was the closest character to Mary in terms of looks and a style that I felt could work. Based on that, I experimented with a few sketches to establish how to draw Mary in a style that was original and yet reminiscent of that franchise.

I looked through Mary's Instagram to see which outfits she wears the most, or which may be considered her most iconic looks, and drew her in those (as seen above). Since I knew the illustration was going to be a cartoon style, I felt it was important to get her costume right so she would still be recognisable.

After settling on a style for Mary and putting together a composition that I liked (after a few less successful attempts), this was the sketch I submitted as proof of concept. I chose to include other queens in the poster as she always has a guest, and I felt that putting a few of them on here helped to give more of a party feel. By drawing the guests in a cutesy, sprite style, it allows Mary to shine as the host in the foreground.

After submitting this sketch and getting the client's approval, I rendered all the characters in Procreate and then brought them over to InDesign to put the whole thing together.

This really was a total rebrand for how Mary is promoted at Arcobaleno. Previously, the event had a heavier gaming/racing feel in the promotional material I had produced, as requested by the client at the time. 

All of the above work was commissioned by Across Rainbows between June 2023 and January 2024. They own the rights to all illustrations within this post.