About

Finding Joy is an online store and mobile creative studio based in Western Sydney, Australia. We provide handpainted and personalised gifts, art supplies, calligraphy and sketch-note services for private events, and opportunities to learn through practice and play during creative workshops. It was created in 2016 by Joy Adan, a Catholic Filipina-Australian writer and artist on a mission to cultivate courage and connection through creativity.

Welcome to my happy place

Hi! I’m Joy. I’m a storytelling, coffee-drinking, book-devouring, stationery-hoarding writer, lettering artist, speaker and workshop facilitator from the Western suburbs of Sydney.

I created Finding Joy as a channel to share my creative projects and to remind myself (and others!) it is always worth making time to find, express and celebrate the joys in life – even life’s simplest or messiest of moments can carry the sacred and profound.

I am a mother of two very energetic boys, and in the midst of the hustle and bustle of work and family life, I try to make time to create because it gives me a sense of peace and progress, and gives me an opportunity to contribute a little something special to share with the world.

Shortly after giving birth to my second son, I experienced postnatal anxiety and depression. In the months that followed, creative lettering became a critical component in my recovery. Though it had been years since I’d picked up a paintbrush for anything other than toddler craft-time, I finally forced myself to slow down; reflect on words, song lyrics, prayers or scripture verses that had meaning to me; to make something with no pressure to achieve perfection. Those late nights of lettering helped me to regain a sense of purpose and peace.

Now, I use Finding Joy to give others the opportunity to gift or make something unique and beautiful for themselves or someone they want to celebrate, to honour the words, colours, images and stories that uplift and empower us, and to revisit the joy and freedom that our creativity unleashes in us.

I hope you find something you love while you’re here and continue to discover, rediscover and share your joy long after you leave.

Joy