On Creating Home for Your Practice: Olive & Ink October 2025
This letter was originally sent to Olive & Ink subscribers in October 2025. Olive & Ink is our monthly Snail Mail Club—handwritten letters, original art prints, and creative writing delivered to mailboxes around the world. Want to receive future envelopes? Subscribe.
Dear Creative,
When I landed in Amsterdam two years ago, I had no home. My suitcase followed me loyally from hostels to sublets, and my creative life suffered because of it. I overflowed with inspiration, but I didn't have a stable environment or the proper tools to actively make. I've since realized how much "home" propels my practice. Sometimes home is a sketchbook, sometimes it's a physical place, and sometimes it's just a cute little corner.
Lately I've been experimenting with setting up small intentional "zones" in my house, designated shelves or corners for certain practices. One altar for meditation. A nook just for painting. Even something as simple as lighting a candle when I journal makes that time feel set apart as I step into a creative mindset. For our October letter, I invite you to try setting up a space like this in your home, and see what happens.
This month's print, Leaving Home, grew from this line of thought. I painted a shell, a fragile sanctuary that's passed down, abandoned and filled again. Flowers and birds emerge outward. This is a meditation on how life continues in the places we leave behind, and how "home" can be found in unlikely places.
You'll also find No Title by Margot Samsom, written in response to our writing club theme, Death of a Whale. In the deep sea, a fallen whale transforms into a whole new ecosystem, nourishing thousands of creatures. Margot connected this imagery to the recent and sudden passing of her mother, writing into the strange space that loss leaves behind.
May this month's work remind you to tend the spaces that help fuel your own creative practice, and to notice what blooms in spaces that are empty. Thank you, from the bottom of my heart, for supporting our community and its creative work each month.
Warmly,
Britt Broadwood
What else was in this month's envelope:
🎨 Print: Leaving Home by Britt Broadwood
A meditation on how life continues in the places we leave behind, and how home can be found in unlikely places.
✍️ Writing: No Title by Margot Samsom
A reflection on loss and transformation, connecting the death of a whale to the space left behind by grief.
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