Our Story

“It all started one exhausting night as I was just coming off of a multi-hour diamond painting session and has once again gone through a roller coaster of emotions. I was so excited to begin because I loved the design on the canvas and truthfully, I needed to clear my mind. Unfortunately, by the time I was about an hour into it, I felt incredibly dissatisfied with the actual quality of the kit, from the canvas material to each piece of the tool kit and even the diamond drills themselves!

I was tired of spending my money and coming out of it all so frustrated. The more time I spent diamond painting, the more it became clear that I needed a kit that reduced anxiety, not caused it!”

Ava Danforth

Dreamer Designs Brand Manager

It was during this time that Ava teamed up with some of her closest, business-savvy friends and the ‘Dream’ was manifested. The secret to starting a great business is being able to differentiate from existing companies and solve common frustrations in the industry. It was with this goal in mind that Ava and Art life workshop CEO Brandon began strategizing to fill the “missing gap” in the diamond painting community.

Art life workshop soon became a lot more than just an idea, quickly developing into an incredible team of people who were not only passionate about diamond painting but also eager to develop a community built on honest and transparent business practices.

After what seemed to be endless research, the team narrowed down what was good, and what could be improved upon in existing diamond painting kits already being sold online. From the sticky adhesive and canvas materials to the stylus pens and tweezers, they worked with them all as a group, pooling their reviews to ensure they were creating the mother of all kits. It soon became time to implement their ideas…

And that’s when Dreamer Designs was officially born.

Our first step was to find beautiful designs. We hunted for a set of very special artists and carefully selected some of their best work to legally license, creating our Dreamer Line of Diamond Canvas Kits™.

We went with 4 different and unique artists and created exclusive relationships with them. This ensures that you won’t find the same designs in any other kits from any other diamond painting company and is completely original to Dreamer Designs. If you would like to see those designs and artist spotlights, head over to our Instagram Page where we have story highlights dedicated to them!

When the designs were finalized and artists were chosen, we set out to transform the designs into an actual physical product.

And so it began. We flew to China and went through many tours of different diamond painting factories. This was a very cool and eye opening experience, as we were able to witness kits being made from the ground up, from the canvases and tool kits to the diamonds and box packaging. After weeks in China, we narrowed our search down to just a couple of factories. We ended up revisiting both of them, carefully weighing all of our options before finally choosing our current factory. We couldn’t be happier with our decision and truly hope you can see the results with our Diamond Canvas Kits™.

You may be wondering, “Why did you choose a factory in China?” We get it - most of our competitors add to the stigma that all made in China products are super cheap and don’t last. This is because they opt for the cheapest possible materials and forgo any quality control in order to save a buck. For us, it all boiled down to the fact that diamond painting was actually invented in China. We were therefore confident that we would not only find the best factory over there, but also be able to use the highest quality materials to produce our Diamond Canvas Kits™.

Once we chose our factory, the fun began! Every piece and component of our kits had to be completely customized. Each individual tool kit accessory, canvas, instructional guide, packaging design and box was designed by our team, then implemented and developed by the factory.

For the diamonds themselves, we opted for a high grade plastic rather than the recycled plastic diamonds our competitors use. This ensures that we have the sparkliest and most vibrant diamonds so that each design emulates the original art piece as closely as possible (watch our factory video HERE). All of our diamonds are 2.5mm square drill bits, as we think these look nicer than the round bits which leave the corners empty. And yes, we do include 20% more diamonds than you really need to ensure there are no missing diamonds in your kit!

Here you can see our diamonds being separated and packaged in our manufacturing facility: (watch our factory video HERE). This machine has been programmed to package the right colour combinations for the designs - how cool is that?

While the accessory kits were coming together and the diamonds were being packaged, we were also creating our actual diamond canvases!

We chose the highest grade 100% woven polyester to print our designs onto. We made this decision because we were tired of dealing with the cheap, plasticky feeling of other kits we had experienced in the past. We also knew that this material would be crease-resistant, making it a more seamless diamond painting experience. Of course, we finalized the designs in advance and had them all set up for printing beforehand. Here you can see the machine moving side to side to get the patterns transferred and printed onto the canvas (watch our factory video HERE ).

Once they are printed on this huge sheet of canvas we need to cut them into individual designs. Here our team is hand cutting the canvas to separate the designs and get them ready for packaging: (watch our factory video HERE).

Once they are cut, we began to assemble the kits. Here you can see our team rolling the canvas and including the instructions around a foam roller: (watch our factory video HERE). As you can see, the canvas is very well protected and you are able to get started on your kit as soon as you open it. Simply unroll it from the foam roller and lay it flat, and the canvas will start taking its shape right away. On a side note, our instructions include a step by step diamond painting guide written in 12 different languages!

Once each of the pieces in the kit has been collected, we begin to assemble the kits themselves (watch our factory video HERE). We begin by assembling the boxes, then the canvases that you saw being rolled, the packaged accessories tool kit and finally the diamond packaging.The kit is then labeled with the info label at the bottom indicating the proper design and dimension so that we are able to send out the correct designs.

The final touch is our carrying handle (watch our factory video HERE). We really love this feature on our packaging! It makes for easy transportation if you want to bring it over to a friend’s house for a diamond painting and wine night, and even makes a cute little gift if you wrap a ribbon around it. Each box also has a plastic film wrapped over top so that the box won’t get scratched during shipping.

That’s it for the actual creation of the kits themselves. We love having these behind the scenes factory videos to show you the process and provide some insight on our factory and how these kits come to life. So much work goes into the creation of the kits, and we are so glad our friends at the manufacturing facility are so lovely and committed to our vision of excellence and quality.

Of course, that’s not all - we have to go through many more steps for these kits to go from our factory to your door! Once each kit is made, it goes through rigorous quality control. Only then is it approved to be sent to our warehouses in Reno and Chicago. By warehousing in two locations in the US, we drastically cut down your shipping time since you don’t have to wait for it to come all the way from China like most other diamond painting companies. Instead, we’re able to offer 2-4 day shipping to all of our US customers!

Our Dreamer Designs headquarters are located on the west coast of Canada. We have a team here that is fully dedicated to this brand, and are working extremely hard to build our diamond painting community and deliver the highest quality kits to you!

Transparency in this process is our top priority. We hope our story was informative and answered all your curiosities.

If you haven’t already, please feel free to join us on our journey on our social channels.