Featured Artist: Wotto

If you’ve ever wanted to befriend the beasties living under your bed, then the DBH artist Wotto can make your dreams (or your nightmares…) come to life! His delightfully original “doodle art style” designs fill the page with brightly colored characters straight out of a daring new fairy tale. The graffiti-inspired graphics invite the monsters under your bed to shed their fangs and claws and come out to strut their stuff in the sunlight.

Wotto, or Craig Watkins, has a deeply rooted relationship with Design By Humans; he has been an important part of the vision and inspiration since the early years of the platform. Originally from the United Kingdom, today Wotto lives in Orange County, California where he loves to “binge watch shows, hang out with my kids and find new and interesting places to eat.” He explains that his name, Wotto, was given to him by a friend when “we used to paint graffiti on things.” He jokes that his style originated from a “healthy dose of pop culture, skateboarding and street art.” Although he never intended to design t-shirts, he is now excited by how well people responded to his art as apparel.

He encourages artists to “work hard, be patient and always be kind.” However, Wotto recognizes that all artists encounter creative blocks in their process. He shares that “doodling in sketchbooks is a good way to clear out the creative clutter” and it allows him to bookmark designs to come back to when he is having trouble finding inspiration.

Wotto believes that creativity is possible for everyone and that “anyone who makes a mark. Anyone who can come up with a solution to a problem” is contributing to the beauty and creativity in the world. In fact, one of his hopes for the future is to make a mark by following his passion to create toys and children’s books. His matchless style and adorable characters are an ideal fit for an illustrated story and will be sure to find a place in the canon of children’s literature; we are excited to see what the future holds for Wotto!