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Make a Living. Make a Life.

I’m Carly. Designer, Mentor and home-ed mum building a life I don’t need to escape from.

Around here, I’m interested in freedom, creativity, motherhood, alternative education, slow travel and questioning the systems we’re told are simply “the way things are.” Mostly, I’m trying to own more of my time - and make something meaningful with it.

 
 
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Collecting Experiences, Not Things.

We’re a home-educating family with a half-built campervan, dreaming of a lifestyle with less bills and burnout. We love slow travel, unusual stays, wild places and finding the stories that make somewhere worth remembering.

I’m especially interested in creative exchange - collaborating with thoughtful stays, spaces and experiences through photography, video, design and storytelling.

Have somewhere we should experience? Let’s make something together

 

My story

A decade ago I was swirling around in my office chair under the fluorescent lights above my desk, knowing I was not where I was meant to be. I was running my creative side business in the evenings and weekends while my corporate marketing job left me overworked, underpaid, and quietly convinced there had to be another way. In 2015, I’d had enough, and I quit.

It felt like glitter was shooting out of my eye sockets the moment I walked out of that office. Being my own boss meant doing work I loved, supporting incredible women, and working from my laptop from anywhere in the world. For a while, that was the dream. Until I realised I'd just recreated the same high-pressure, overachieving burnout cycle in a different outfit.

So I did something that surprised even me. I slowed down, on purpose.

In the September my daughter was due to start primary school, I decided not to send her and home educate instead. I restructured my business around our life instead of the other way around. I started asking different questions. Not how do I do more? but what actually matters?

And then my body joined the conversation too. Perimenopause arrived earlier than expected, which has a way of making the non-negotiables very clear, very fast. I'm still in it. Some days are brilliant. Some are a fog. But it's made me a better advocate for building businesses with real flexibility built in - not flexibility as a perk, but as the actual foundation.

Today, I design for brilliant brands, create content about conscious living, and help women like you figure out what they actually want to build - and then build it.

 

I wrote an album…

Slow Rebel

A soulful journey back to self, this album explores what happens when you stop living by expectation and start choosing what feels true. It’s about slowing down, trusting your body, letting go of the “shoulds,” and designing a life that fits. My own lyrics, brought to life through AI-assisted production.

Tracks include:

Cracked in the quiet - about my journey
Wild curriculum - about home education
Sponsored dreams - about growing up
Mother mirror - about motherhood

 
 
 
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What I’m all about…

I believe work should support a life well lived, not consume it. I’m all for flexible work, thoughtful businesses and creating enough freedom - in our time, money and capacity - to be present with our kids, explore the world, follow our curiosity and spend more of our life actually living it.

 

Get in touch

I’d love to introduce myself and get to know you over a virtual cuppa. Please click the link below to fill in my enquiry form and I’ll be in touch asap to set up a call.