It’s International Dog Day next month (26th August), so I wanted to celebrate all the brilliant live dog portrait events I’ve worked on this year.

From hundreds of portraits in John Lewis stores, to a Dog BBQ at 1 Hotel Mayfair, and Dog Portraits to celebrate the launch of the book ‘Chic Dogs’ at Maison Assouline.

Live Dog Portraits are a brilliant way to elevate your dog friendly event and create brand loyalty from your customers.

The portraits can be a gift with purchase, which helps bring customers onto your stores. This was the set up for the event I illustrated at for Assouline in March.

Customers were asked to make a purchase in store, and then they could have their dogs portraits painted by a resident artist, subject to availability on the day. This was part of a worldwide series of launch events for Assouline at their flagship stores in New York, Paris, London and Palm Beach.

At each venue they had local illustrators capturing live portraits of customers dogs. Deanna First created live portraits in New York, Lindsey Kate in Palm Beach, Anastasiia Lekontseva in Paris, and myself and Niki Groom in London.

Below are some examples of the portraits I created on the day at Maison Assouline. You can also read more in this blog post.

When I worked with John Lewis and Partners, they were keen to promote the fact that many of their stores in the UK are dog friendly.

Customers could bring their dogs into store for a complimentary live portrait on selected dates.

I travelled to stores across the south of the UK including Reading, London (White City, Oxford Street, Brent Cross), Cheltenham, Oxford, Welling Garden City and Chichester.

During the summer, this was a great way to get footfall in their stores as this is generally a quieter time of year for retail. And in the lead up to Christmas, dog portraits were extremely popular with customers looking for unique gifts for loved ones.

To celebrate International Dog Day in 2024 I was invited by 1 Hotel Mayfair in London to create live portraits of their guests dogs at a Dog BBQ event, which was also sponsored by Beco. It was a wonderful way to promote their dog friendly credentials and really make their guests feel at home.

1 Hotel Mayfair, which is just a few steps from Green Park, was built and reimagined to reduce CO2 emissions and accelerate sustainable practices.

They are a super dog friendly hotel with lots of extra touches to make their four legged guests feel at home. They have a dog-friendly concierge team with information about Mayfair's best dog parks, pet shops, grooming salons and more. They can also provide the essentials in case you forget, including beds, bowls, poo bags, healthy food, and more.

I was lucky enough to have the opportunity to stay at their beautiful hotel this spring for my birthday. It was such a wonderfully relaxing experience, with every little detail thought of, from a bottle of champagne and chocolates in our room, to delicious sustainably sourced cocktails and an indulgent brunch menu.

In June I was also invited to create live portraits of dogs at the Butternut Box company away day in Cambridgeshire. It was a super fun festival style event on an extremely hot day!

I painted pet portraits from guests photos in just 10 minutes using watercolour and fineliner pen. It was so lovely to see all the smiling faces when they collected their portraits.

I was working alongside Sarah Smart and Jo Bird who created super cute live portraits in their signature colourful styles.

Having multiple illustrators at your event is a great option if you know you have a large guest list, but limited time. If you have a larger event in mind, I can recommend a range of other illustrators who can work with me.