Design Team

World map showing the different home countries of each Altenew Card Design Team Member
Svitlana Shayevich

Svitlana was born and raised in Ukraine and moved to NYC in 2010 when she married her husband. She holds an Applied Mathematics master’s degree and is a full-time software developer. She started paper crafting in 2010 when she first made a scrapbook album. She has tried different styles and projects since then. But once she discovered clean and simple style in card-making, it became her major passion. Now she mostly makes CAS cards although, sometimes, among her work, you can find vintage or mixed-media projects. Her biggest love in the creative process are techniques. Svitlana likes learning new techniques, discovering and trying new supplies and tools.

You can find Svitlana's creations on her blog and connect with her on Instagram, Flickr and Facebook.

Lydia Evans

Lydia lives in Buckley, Flintshire, North Wales, U.K. with her husband and their two little ones. She has a degree in English and Media and has always wanted to be a children’s TV presenter when she was younger. She has always been crafty; ever since she can remember, she has been cutting paper and sticking things. She got into stamping through scrapbooking. She started scrapbooking in 2009 when she had her little boy and then wanted to take her pages further and make her own patterned paper - stamping helped her do just that. Her passion is for CAS style cards; she sometimes likes to add lots of techniques into her cards but there is always a clean look about them. Lydia has been published in a number of magazines and represents Altenew on U.K.'s Create and Craft channel.

You can find more of Lydia's creations on her blog and connect with her on FacebookFlickrInstagram and Youtube.

Agnieszka Malyszek

Aga is a short form of her name, Agnieszka. She was born and raised in Poland and moved a couple of years ago to Manchester, England. She always loved being creative and, about 6 years ago, she started her paper crafting adventure by making cards for family and friends. She has been hooked on card-making ever since. During this time, Aga has served as a member of several design teams and has guest designed projects for a number of others. She has been published in numerous craft publications and contributed to several craft-related classes. Among other honors, she was also chosen as one of the 10 finalists in the Paper Crafts 2012 Gallery Idol Contest. She describes her style as clean and simple, with a touch of ink splatters and messy thread tangles.

You can find Aga's creations on her blog and connect with her on Instagram, Pinterest and Flickr.

Erum Tasneem

Her friends call her E.T. She hails from Karachi, Pakistan. She started blogging in 2008 and named her blog "VIBGYOR Krafts" because she loves rainbow colors. Her crafting style varies from shabby chic to CAS and she can accomplish both looks beautifully. She loves to color - whether it's watercoloring or pencil coloring. Her friends motivated her to start selling her work so, in 2010, she launched her brand Glitter & Swirls where she sells her work and also takes on commission work. When she is not crafting she is rescuing injured or abandoned pets. She has a house full of cats of her own too; she loves them unconditionally.

You can find Erum's creations on her blog and connect with her on Instagram, FacebookPinterest, YouTube, and Flickr.

Therese Calvird

Therese lives on the Gold Coast in Australia with her husband and two precious cats. She has also lived and worked overseas a few times; in the U.K. and in Guernsey. She has always enjoyed many kinds of crafting, but everything was put aside when she found her love of card-making in 2005. She wanted to share the joy so she created her Youtube channel in 2012 and along with design teams, magazine publications, swimming, camping and travel (oh, and full-time shift work) she manages to keep herself quite busy. She likes to try out many different styles and techniques, but especially loves to create with flowers.

You can find Therese's creations on her blog and connect with her on Youtube and Pinterest, and Instagram.

Emily Midgett

Emily lives in the Midwest with her husband, big twins and baby twins, two cats, and a large dog. In a past life, she obtained a master’s degree in music, specifically voice, and had a private voice studio, but she became a stay-at-home mom after her older set of twins was born. She has been crafting for most of her life in one form or another, dabbling in painting, drawing, jewelry-making, scrapbooking, and Cricut-crafting. (Basically, being a craft-supply collector.) Her love of papercrafting really intensified after getting married, when she was looking for the perfect thank you notes and ended up purchasing half of the stamp aisle and many shades of blue ink from Hobby Lobby - the start of a slippery slope. While stamping was the beginning of her papercrafting passion, she now has discovered her true love: coloring. Watercolors, alcohol markers, and colored pencils are never far from her reach, and coloring Altenew flowers is one of her favorite ways to unwind from the stresses of mom-life. Flowers, vivid color, and the occasional sparkle can always be found on Emily’s projects! You can find Emily's creations on her blog and connect with Instagram.

Tenia Nelson

Tenia Nelson grew up in the San Francisco Bay Area but has called Denver, Colorado her home since 1990. She is a wife to Tim (16+ years!!), momma to Thelonious (10 years old), and doggie momma to Snowball. When Tenia is not making cards or getting inky, she plays music professionally as a pianist and percussionist and teaches private and public school music (over 20 years!). Tenia got her start in paper crafting over 20 years ago and dabbles in everything from cardmaking and scrapbooking to mixed media, hand lettering, and metal stamping. Tenia’s cardmaking style can be described as CAS Cray Cray (CAS with LOTS of FUN and goodness going on)!

You can find Tenia's creations on her blog and connect with her on Instagram and Facebook.

Jaycee Gaspar

Jaycee Gaspar is a military brat born in Alabama and has called Colorado home since 2002 after years of living overseas. He is a full-time Medical Laboratory Scientist specializing in referral testing and specimen management. During his time away from the lab, Jaycee is grateful for the time to exercise creativity in card making and other paper crafting projects since 2015. His design style is inspired by street art, graphic design, and geometry with deliberate details and composition. His range of creativity also encompasses photography, painting, drawing, and now video editing. Jaycee also loves spending time outside running and participating in local races. The lovely Colorado atmosphere also pulls him and his partner to hike and explore many mountain trails.

You can find Jaycee's creations on his blog and connect with him on Instagram and YouTube.

Michelle Short

Michelle is a papercrafter, blogger, and creative content creator from London, UK. She has a degree in Healthcare Practice and became qualified as a nurse in 2008. She has always been crafty in one way or another but was introduced to card making over 15 years ago and has never looked back! She started her blog in 2007 and YouTube channel in 2011. Throughout the years, she has been part of several design teams and has been published in magazines. Michelle’s style is clean and simple, but she does like to incorporate different techniques (including getting inky!) into her CAS style.

You can find Michelle's creations on her blog and connect with her on Instagram, Facebook, Pinterest and YouTube.

Nathalie DeSousa

Nathalie (aka Tachita, her nickname since birth) was born and raised in Ecuador but calls Toronto, Canada home for most her adult life. She is blessed to be a stay-at-home wife and mom to her teenagers and baby Boston Terrier. She has been enamored with paper crafting and documenting since the day her mom gave her a small paper pad and color pens to play with as a child. Through her life, she has kept a detailed journal of her days and started to transform her journal entries into a more visual format just three years ago. Her style is always evolving, but she loves adding mixed media to her pages and combining black and white photography with lots of colors. You can always find her with her camera on hand, enjoying time with her family or at the dining room table with her black coffee creating her projects.

Make sure to stop by Nathalie’s blog and connect with her on Instagram, Pinterest, and YouTube.

Reiko Tsuchida

Reiko lives in Chiba, Japan with her husband and two teenage girls. She started scrapbooking in 2000 and has a passion for scrapbooking and photography. She leads workshops at the trade shows and creates scrapbooking pages for magazines and websites as her job. But still, scrapbooking is her creative escape and medicine for her soul and it always brings her and her family more happiness. Creativity is always on her mind and adds so much to her everyday life.

Make sure to stop by Reiko’s blog and connect with her on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter.

Past Designers

Jenny Colacicco
Laurie Willison
Lilith Eeckels
Virginia Lu
May Park
Sveta Fotinia
Rubeena Ianigro
Laura Bassen
Yoonsun Hur
Yana Smakula
Marika Rahtu
Amy Gray
Anna Kossavoskaya
Debbie Hughes
Melania Deasy
Jocelyn Olson