IDENTIFIES AS
Multi-passionate Creative — Artful Explorer — Maker at Heart
meet
Esther
Esther Dekoning is a designer + art director based in Ontario.
Hi, I’m Esther! By trade I’m a designer, and by design I’m an explorer.
I’m all about crafting thoughtful, innovative, and intriguing campaign art and brand identities that push the boundaries of design. Over the past 8 years, I’ve worked between advertising agencies, in-house design teams, and my own design studio, Sereth Design, where I support nonprofits and “brands who give a crap” to tell empathetic stories across brand and digital.
My approach to design is rooted in storytelling, which I fell in love with after experiencing culture and story from a variety of worldviews. My outlook on story is influenced by my childhood splitting time between the United States and China, interning abroad in Ghana during university, traveling to Kenya to visit clients-turned-friends, and the many friendships I have made with people who live around the globe. I have found it incredibly powerful to bridge the gap between culture and design. I find that through design, I get to tell stories, evoke emotion, and connect people across landscapes.
When I’m not designing, you’ll find me poring through yet another book about gardening, making food for my friends (I’m writing a cookbook!), or hanging out in my backyard with my partner and trusty pup and dreaming of our next road trip.
My creative practice is inspired by Wabi Sabi. But it wasn’t always that way.
I’ve always been creative.
When I was young, making things was my happy place. I painted portraits of my family, designed my own board game, and even dabbled in sidewalk entrepreneurship as I attempted to sell my yarn crafts and cutesy bookmarks.
Whenever I found a new hobby, I’d dive straight in and obsess over it. That curiosity has never stopped for me.
But… as I grew up, doubts started to creep in:
“I’m not good at ANY of these things, I should just pick one and be happy.”
So, I did. I focused my energy on digital design. I focused my education and career on advertising, brand design, and website design and for a decade, it was my whole life. In 2020, I started my design studio, Sereth, doubling down on making my natural creativity my life’s work. And I loved every moment of it.
Over time, my creativity started to dwindle. I felt stuck and uninspired. I hadn’t realized that in my pursuit of building a business, I had abandoned my creative inklings. I had stopped playing and engaging curiosities little Esther once had.
In 2024, I picked up the book “The Artist’s Way” by Julia Cameron. A book a friend had given me a year prior, but I let collect dust on the shelf. Game. Changer.
I learned that the little Esther inside me wanted to make things and even needed to make things. It was what I was put on this blue dot to do. The young me that dabbled in just about everything was thriving. She was exploring. She was alive.
That’s when I realized: I’m not flaky or indecisive. I’m multi-passionate. My curiosity isn’t a distraction from the path; it is the path.
Now, I’m learning to honor that part of myself again. I’m experimenting. I’m playing. I’m letting my interests lead the way without demanding an outcome. Some days that looks like painting just because I feel like it, or spending a whole day taking pictures of rocks just because. Other days, it’s slow and reflective—a walk with my camera, a journaling session, or simply sitting still, tuning in.
Mindfulness has helped me reconnect with the joy of creating for no other reason than to create. I’m rebuilding my relationship with curiosity. Learning to see it not as a detour, but as a lens through which I experience the world with wonder and depth.
One idea that’s really resonated with me is wabi-sabi—the Japanese philosophy that finds beauty in imperfection, impermanence, and the unfinished. It’s helped me release the pressure to be polished or “good” at everything. Creativity doesn’t have to be perfect to be meaningful. The cracks, the messiness, the rough edges… they’re part of the story, too.
It’s not about mastering every craft or chasing every fleeting idea. It’s about being open, playing with perspective, and allowing my passions to ebb, flow, and intersect.
Lifelong learning and play—
that’s the energy I’m bringing into this chapter.
Thanks for joining me! I can’t wait to share all my learnings with you. And if you find yourself multi-passionated, or even just want to try your hand at something new…
I hope you feel seen.
“Your teachers are all around you. All that you perceive, all that you experience, all that is given to you or taken from you, all that you love or hate, need or fear will teach you—if you will learn.”
— Octavia Butler from “Parable of the Sower”
Areas of Expertise
Brand Identity
Brand strategy • Logo design • Colour • Typography • Layout • Visual systems • Guidelines
Art Direction
Campaigns • Social • Out-of-home • Photo + Video Direction • Visual storytelling
UX/UI Design
Wireframing • User flows • Prototyping • Interaction design • Web design • Mobile interfaces • Development
Publications • Editorial • Packaging • Marketing collateral • Signage • Merch
