Every great love story starts with friendship. Conversations that make you feel connected, understood, and ultimately, loved. It was 4 years ago that Queenie joined the firm Calvin was working at. Their story took time to unfold though. On her first day at work, Queenie met a rather grumpy Calvin, who was having a rough day as he had to take over some additional work from someone who had left the firm. He was swamped with work and hardly had time to talk to her (though she sat next to him). Basically, Calvin just kept his distance.
Maybe being introverted had something to do with it, but during Queenie’s training over 3 months, Calvin hardly spoke to her. It wasn’t as if she hadn’t attracted his attention… through all that work, Calvin found time to just glance at her, half the time, wondering what she was doing (he claims he is a nosy person). He wanted to actually talk to her more, but didn’t know how to approach her. Finally, when her training period was about to end and she was offered a work contract, he found the courage to properly chat with her. It was a turning point for them, and after that, they became normal work colleagues, chatting about general stuff.
When their firm moved location, they started having lunches daily and that was when Calvin discovered the real Queenie, over conversations about family, life and relationships. Though their friendship grew, they were both in different relationships. In 2013, Calvin took a year off for personal family reasons. During this time away, he missed their daily lunches and thought about her often. In 2014, he joined the firm again, and it felt natural to hang out with each other again. That same year, both their previous relationships ended. Calvin decided she was worth it, took the plunge and bared his heart to Queenie. They have been inseparable ever since.
It’s a bookish kind of love. Sort of. Well, how do we put it… she loves books, and he doesn’t (other than comic books). Lynette is one book-reading machine – she can devour 3 books in a day! Lynette’s always nagging Alvin to read more books other than comics, so it was quite fun to illustrate this dynamic relationship through images. I love how Lynette also made her entire bouquet out of comic books (poor Alvin – I hope it didn’t come from his beloved collection!).
Other than this book connection, Alvin and Lynette have another geeky connection – their shared love of Star Wars. We love their customised t-shirts and their entire make shift ‘campsite’ – representative of the idea that they’ll go camping together one day. Alvin loves the night sky and twinkly little lights, but somehow has never gone camping before. Lynette, on the other hand, has had countless camping experiences, especially when she was studying in Australia. So I guess an indoor camping trip to our studio would have to do for now! (sorry, we didn’t manage to paste the glow-in-the-dark stars on the ceiling that day).
