⏤ 𝗮𝗲𝘀𝗽𝗮
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welcome to adopt a cover!
PLEASE READ BELOW

ੈ✩˚⊹ hello, my lovelies, as most of you know i make covers. some i craft for myself, some for others, though if i'm honest, the balance tips heavily in favor of the former. i wish i could say it's intentional — this ratio, this slant toward self-indulgence — but it isn't, not really. it just happens that way.

i take my time with every project, gather my inspirations the way an oyster gathers grit from the ocean's swell, collecting small bits of light and color from things people tell me, or don't tell me, or from stories they hope someone will someday tell. but even when everything aligns and i feel i've struck upon something real, i still hesitate. and then i leave it sitting there.

the covers i make for myself — those, i treasure. i know them deeply, the way one might know the shape of their own hands. they are familiar things, soft and solid at once, imbued with the kind of beauty that only you can recognize in your own work. the fonts, the textures, the way the light curls against a title or breaks along the edge of a silhouette — it all feels right to me, perfectly aligned with the story that existed in my mind, long before the cover ever did.

but the covers i make for others? those haunt me. they sit in a kind of limbo, as if waiting for me to believe in them the way i believe in the ones i keep for myself. i can't help but notice the difference, and that difference gnaws at me. it's subtle, but it's there, like a stray thread on the sleeve of a new coat, unraveling just enough to catch your finger when you run your hand over it.

no one else seems to see it — they say the designs are lovely, they send polite thank-you notes, a few compliments, perhaps even an exclamation mark at the end of their messages. but none of that lands where it should. to me, those covers are never quite enough, never quite whole.

i try not to dwell on it, but it's difficult.

it's a bit like cooking, i think, you can follow a recipe to the letter, use the finest ingredients, measure everything carefully, but when the dish is finally plated and placed on the table, you realize that something's missing. not something you can name — no amount of salt or spice would fix it. it's an absence of intent, maybe, or joy. as if the heart you put into it got lost somewhere between the kitchen counter and the dinner plate. that's how it feels with the covers i give away. they are technically sound, polished, and presentable, but they lack something — some sliver of magic i can't seem to transfer.

when i sit down to create for myself, the process feels different. it's like a conversation with a story i already know by heart. i don't rush those moments. i let the images arrive slowly, sifting through dozens of fonts and photos, tweaking the hue of a background by the smallest of margins, until the design clicks into place like a jigsaw puzzle piece finally finding its match.

for a moment, the world feels orderly, as if everything — at least in this tiny corner of my life — makes sense. and that feeling, i think, is the reason i make covers at all. not to sell them, not even to give them away, but to feel that fleeting sense of completeness.

with other people's covers, though, i lose that certainty. it's not that i don't care about them — i do. i listen carefully to every brief, try to imagine what the author sees when they picture their book sitting on a shelf. i want to do justice to their stories. i want to give them something beautiful. but no matter how hard i try, there's always a gap, a slight disconnect between what i envision and what i hand over. and i can't unsee that gap, no matter how small it is. it lingers like a smudge on the lens of a camera, blurring everything just enough to leave me dissatisfied.

maybe that's why i hold on to so many of my own designs, why so many covers sit quietly on my hard drive, unseen by anyone but me. they feel like secret little gardens, cultivated with care, where everything blooms just the way i imagined. they don't need to be good enough for anyone else, because they are already perfect for me.

but lately, i've been wondering if that's enough. if maybe i'm hoarding all the wrong things, like a squirrel burying acorns it never intends to eat. what good are these covers if they never leave the safety of my laptop? what if the ones i give away — the ones i'm certain aren't enough — are exactly what someone else needs to see?

there's this whole world out there — cover shops, they call them. places where readers, writers, and dreamers submit requests, laying out all the vibes they want captured on a book cover. it's almost like alchemy, the way they describe it: soft grunge with a hint of melancholy, but not too dark. maybe a celestial theme, but no stars — moons only. or something clean and modern, but still romantic, with a very specific shade of green that reminds them of springtime after rain. sometimes they'll name a face claim — actors, models, or those impossibly beautiful people whose photos circulate online without names or origins — so the designer has a reference, a muse, someone to center the design around. it's a game of matching aesthetics to feelings, turning words into images, ideas into textures. but even with all that direction, it's not always easy to make magic on demand.

and then there are cover lottos, which are more like a gamble. readers still submit their requests — spilling out their hopes for the perfect cover, as if tossing coins into a well — but this time, the creator holds all the power. if a request catches their eye, sparks something inside them, they might take it on. or they might not. there are no guarantees. the thrill lies in the uncertainty, the possibility that your story might be chosen, or that it might not.

i tried it once — tried to start one of those cover books where people could request from me, lay out their visions, and trust me to shape them into something real. i thought maybe the structure would help, that the requests would light something in me the way a scrap of song or a piece of conversation sometimes does.

but it didn't.

the covers started out okay — some were even promising — but then, somewhere along the way, the inspiration would sputter out, like a candle too close to an open window. i'd sit there, staring at half-finished layers, wondering how i'd lost the thread. and the more i tried to force it, the heavier it became, until i couldn't see a way to finish without hating the result. every cover felt stiff, as if it had been manufactured instead of made. and so i'd discard them, one by one, burying them in folders i promised myself i'd come back to, though i never did.

it felt like failing, though i wasn't sure what exactly i'd failed at.

so i stopped trying.

and that's when the idea came to me. instead of wrestling with deadlines or waiting for requests to spark something in me, why not flip it around? why not make the covers i want to make, in my own time, and then offer them up to whoever wants them? no strings, no promises, no pressure. just covers, waiting to be claimed.

whenever i feel that flicker of inspiration — when the right font meets the right texture, and the colors fall together like rain on leaves — i make the cover. i finish it. and then, instead of letting it sit unseen on my hard drive, i post it here.

no requests, no commissions. just something that exists because it wanted to, because i let it. whoever resonates with it can ask to adopt it.

but here's the thing: the covers are premade. they are what they are. there's no tweaking or customizing — no changing the title, the font, or the face claim. each cover is its own little moment, complete and untouchable, like a pressed flower between the pages of a book. the reader — the one who adopts it — has to see something in it, something that matches their story, or at least brushes close enough to feel like it belongs. and maybe that sounds limiting, but to me, it feels freeing.

it's less about creating on demand and more about releasing what's already been created.

i think of it like setting birds loose from cages. some of the covers might fly off quickly, claimed and loved right away. others might sit quietly, waiting for someone to notice them. but either way, they'll be free. no longer trapped in my files, gathering dust and second-guessing. they'll be out there, in the world, where they belong.

and maybe that's all i've ever wanted, really. to let the covers find their people, instead of trying to bend myself into shapes i can't sustain. this way, i create when i want to create. i make what feels right to me. and when the moment passes, the cover waits for someone else to see it the way i saw it — whole, beautiful, ready.

so this is me, setting those covers loose. one by one, as they come to me. and maybe one of them will find its way to you.