Photography provided by Giphy

Greetings and welcome to our 2019 segment of #DEBlackHistory!
Just like last year, we are showing love to our fellow blog friends over at Buzz on HR by participating in their black history blogging challenge for the month of February again this year. Last year, we focused on producing one artwork per day pertaining to each prompt presented daily. This year, we are changing things up a bit and plan to focus on entire blog posts pertaining to each prompt topic daily. Some may contain new art and others may be more informative depending on the topic of each day.

Our first topic of our #DEBlackHistory segment is Black History.

If you did not already know, Delux Designs (DE), LLC is a black owned freelance design service that was founded and is run by a black, female business owner (@K_DougDE). Everyone always asks me hundreds of questions pertaining to the DE business and the history of how it was created. One of the main questions received the most is how exactly I feel personally about being not only a female business owner, but a black female business owner at this point and time in my life. The answer to this popular question is I feel really blessed and fortunate. I was fortunate enough and had the resources necessary to start my very own graphic’s service at the age of 14 years old thanks to our old social media friend Myspace. During the Myspace era, there was a wave of graphic arts through the once social media giant due to the freedom you had at the time to customize your pages and features of your pages with no restrictions. Literally, there were no restrictions nor regulations like we have today with social media so you were able to design and code full webpages for free. With that freedom of designing, I was able to truly learn how to HTML code on my own. Then when Javascript came along, that was no different, I learned it the same way I did with HTML through Myspace. From coding, I went on to learn how to create my own profile pictures and page layouts with my initial favorite software for designing Coral Paintshop Pro. This program was similar to Adobe Photoshop but of course some things I was limited to creating and the quality of my work was not as good as it could be, but it was free and worked for me at the time.

With my actions of learning on my own early about coding and designing, and even advertising on the low, I was able to to begin Delux Designs (DE), LLC at the age of 18 years old on December 21, 2010 while sitting on my mom’s couch during the winter break of my first semester of my freshman undergrad year of college while attending the University of South Carolina Upstate out of Spartanburg, South Carolina.
We have been flourishing ever since!

In the beginning, I didn’t know anything about business, let alone black business.
I just knew I wanted to design freely while helping others around me as much as I could, and also making a profit for me to live how I wanted to. I didn’t realize the importance of me being only 18 years old at the time officially opening up her own business as a female black business owner. Representation really does matter at the end of the day and I am happy to represent and be in the pool of powerful black women out here starting their own services, businesses and catering to serving the public while owning our own. Back then during 2010, I didn’t necessary have that representation or one set person whom I looked up to around me physically, but I have always looked up to the late Madame C.J. Walker’s legacy the most when it comes to black business history.

Madame C.J. Walker Digital Illustration Designed by @K_DougDE

Madame C.J. Walker, or Sarah Breedlove, was an entrepreneur and philanthropist who was the first African American woman to become a self-made millionaire.
Madame C.J. Walker was a boss overall. Reading so many different articles and stories about her, you could tell she meant business when it came down to it and intended to be successful no matter the circumstances she faced. For me, reading up on her gave me more confidence in what I intend to do with my service. During that time period of her reign, things were a lot tougher and black people didn’t have as many advances, resources and freedoms back then as we do now. This lets me know that I have limited to no excuses of not being a successful, black women like Madame C.J. Walker whom has paved the way with little to nothing. It is up to me to make things happen at this point in life and make people like her proud of the sacrifices she had to make as an example for younger generations.

In celebration of today’s topic of #DEBlackHistory being black history we have a couple offers for you listed below:

• Check out the new Madame C.J. Walker collection with our affiliate partner Society6 by clicking here. Included are gift sets, stationary cards, phone cases and art prints featuring the illustration designed by Visual Artist Keara Douglas shown above.
• All Event Flyer designs are currently discounted to $25 USD for the month of February! Place your order by clicking here.
• Enjoy a discounted price on your tickets for our upcoming RAW Artist Showcase scheduled for Wednesday, February 27, 2019 at The Fillmore in Charlotte, North Carolina by clicking here.
• Join our DE Directory for more exposure for your blog, website or service by clicking here.
  

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Thanks for reading everyone and stay tuned for day 2 of #DEBlackHistory!

For continuous updates on all new art work, art events and much more follow our social media page links listed below. Thanks for your support everyone!
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