Sophie Frizzell, 19, founded Doggy Designz, an Instagram-based business where people can transform photos of their beloved pets into a print.
"The print is a creative art piece that is fun and bright and shows hints of your pet's character."
The Victoria University Interior Architecture student had an assessment where she had to make a poster with a written Pēpeha. In finding her Kohukohunui, she decided to edit a photo of layering different colours of a landscape and then decided to add her favourite thing into it - her dog Stella.
"After layering an image of my dog up, it worked so well that I decided to start making more for my friends' pets.
"It wasn't until I got so many requests that my dad encouraged me to try and get some money out of it."
Sophie has been running her new business for just over two weeks and has made 12 prints of both dogs and cats.
"There are 11 prints that are still to be made and the price of the prints is moving up as the time spent on them also increases."
Pricing depends on the detail of the photo and how long it takes. Sophie has categorised prints into three levels, ranging from $20 to $50.
Sophie determines the detail of the print depending on the pet itself. If your fluffy one has lots of curls of different colour tones, then it would be more expensive.
"A high detail print could take anywhere between four to five hours and time is money."
In the future, she would like her customers to have the option to get them printed and framed, then mailed to take out the hassle at their end.
"This would also make it more exciting for the customer to see their pets on a large print.
"I would also like to be able to put the digital file on a USB stick to preserve the quality so that families can use the print in whatever way they want."
Sophie's goals for her new business endeavour are to reach new people from all areas so she can share her love of animals with others.
"I aim to make people smile and fall in love with their pets all over again."
