It’s all about basil

Before I begin, I wanted to tell you that this post isn’t about the food I made at home or tried in my travels. Even though the hero of this post is basil; one of my favorite ingredients of all time, this is going to be my first post about another passion of mine “visual art”. I know I have been absent here for a while; aside from living like a nomad moving and traveling around, I have been busy creating printable wall arts that are inspired by beautiful ingredients from nature and my own recipes. And it was about time that I shared them with you on this site. It doesn’t mean that food related contents won’t be here any more, my cooking and eating journey will continue as it always has.

I recently came across a quote “Happiness is, the smell of basil”

So true, right? I can’t think of a single person who wouldn’t love the intoxicatingly beautiful aroma of basil in the room. Basil has been my obsession for some time, not just my favorite herb, an obsession. I love the taste, smell, shape and color of basil and how easy it is to grow. It is in fact the first plant I ever grew successfully with the help of a smart garden system in my apartment. I have absolutely no green thumb, no matter what I do I can’t seem to keep my plants alive. Maybe because I’ve spent most of my life in big chaotic cities and grew up with no relatives from the countryside to guide me through it, gardening has always been an intimidating activity for me.

But like everyone else during Covid, I had to find something that would spark joy in my life. And I thought filling my living room with the smell of basil would do the job, provided I managed to keep the basil alive of course. And the fact that I tried to grow red chard with the same smart garden and failed miserably in the past made me even more anxious about the challenge. But one day against all odds, tiny green sprouts started popping their heads out and in no time my basil babies grew and grew and grew. And did it spark joy? You bet it did. So much joy in fact that I seemed to have developed a strong attachment to the basil and felt incredibly bad harvesting the leaves when they grew too tall to stay where they were. So before putting the basil leaves into a food processor to make pesto (they made absolutely delicious pesto by the way), I laid them flat and photographed them.

These leaves were gorgeous before the harvest but seemed even more so laid out this way. I loved how I could see almost every little detail of veins and structures of the basil leaves from this angle. I stared at them for a while trying to figure out what else I could do with these beauties. And that’s how my journey of creating basil illustration began. With an interior design background, art and design have been my passion even before food. The idea of starting Spicy Candied Life was born with a few food doodles and notes in my sketchbook after all. So with my digital drawing tablet and a few photos of stunning basil leaves I started creating my wall art. After experimenting with countless images for a while, I’ve finally come up with a few versions that I like, and here they are!

What do you think? Which one is your favorite? Any feedback or questions are welcome so please feel free to comment and let me know what you think. And in case you were wondering how they look in frames, here are some mockups.

If you’re interested in learning more about them, please check out this page

Last 3 years have changed how we live our lives. I believe more of us care about having a beautiful and comfortable home where we can work, rest and spend time with our loved ones these days. And after working as an interior designer for years, I know how designing and decorating your home can be daunting and stressful sometimes. But I also know for a fact that you don’t necessarily need a huge budget or effort to make your home beautiful. You can always start small, and adding a little extra flair with simple and affordable home accessories and wall art is definitely a good first step.