Our guest today is Susie Atkin of Urban Road, an amazing multi-tasker who has managed to create her business in the down time while her three children were sleeping. Her canvas art prints are testament to her talent for drawing and painting, which she combines with digital wizardry to create fun and affordable art for every day.

Suzie, what's your background? How did you come to start Urban Road?
It's a long story! The short version is that I always loved art while I was growing up. My parents were crafters and my brother, two sisters and I were their production line. We spent a lot of time hanging out at the markets on the weekends, which put me off craft for a while but it's in my blood and wasn't stifled for long. In Year 12 I decided I wanted to be an art teacher, but was encouraged to do business by my well-intentioned father. So, I ended up in IT and I was lucky enough to get a job with a design software company (guess who!). When I discovered their software I fell in love with its possibilities. I spent a lot of my spare time tinkering, but continued down the corporate career path.

After I had my first child I started doing illustrations for other people, mainly portraits and called myself "Pop Me". I am pretty fickle when it comes to decorating my house and I like to change colours and styles every now and then, but finding something I really liked that was affordable and would cover large expanses of wall space was difficult, so I decided to create it myself. So, in 2010 I started Urban Road with a view to creating fabulous artwork at super affordable prices, and here I am today!

You now have three kids – how do you balance work and family life?
I have to say I have been very blessed with timing on that front. Just as Urban Road started to "pick up" my middle girl (Ava) started kindy and my youngest (Thomas) started preschool 2 days a week, which gave me a little more time to focus on business. Prior to that I was working nights and during sleep time & TV time (probably more TV time than I care to mention!). Now I have 3 "mini days" 9:30am - 2:30pm to get all of my work done and I still spend a couple of hours most nights working. It is a juggle, but working from home gives me the flexibility to fit work in around my family which is great, and I absolutely love what I do.

Can you tell us more about how you create the works? What is a giclee print?
Yes, I love painting with inks, it is my favourite medium at the moment. When I get an idea I will paint and sketch my ideas on paper, then I scan them into the computer at super high resolution (as all of my work is designed to be printed on huge canvases) then finish them off in Illustrator and Photoshop.

I love prints on canvas (even though paper seems to be the current trend) my vision with Urban Road is to make LARGE canvas prints gorgeous and affordable because often they are neither. Canvas printing (also known as "giclee printing") is an inkjet method of printing. Urban Road uses eco-solvent inks and prints onto 100% cotton canvas which is then stretched onto kiln dried wooden stretcher bars and mounted, ready to hang.

Where do you find your inspiration?
Everywhere ... that is, is I am always looking for my next idea. So because it is always on my mind, it's like a filter, everything I look at seems to sift through my brain that way. I do love reading blogs and mags too and Pinterest is a new favourite ... I could spend hours there ... if I had the time!!