Hi there!
As some of you might know, my name is Augustė (pronounced like the month) and I am the face behind C H O C I A N A I T Ė.
I love buckwheat, yoga, scented candles, trekking/hiking/naturing, rainy weather, coffee, Bukowski, podcasts, jazz, and much much more.
I work from both commercial and home studios in Bristol, with plans to move my work to Barcelona by 2021. Anyway, here's my story:
I grew up in the most beautiful seaside city in Lithuania - Klaipėda. With endless sand dunes, pine tree forests, and the most gorgeous sea on my doorstep I've been carrying my camera everywhere I went ever since I can remember.
I moved to the UK after having just turned 18 to pursue my life-long dream to become a serious journalist. You know, Kade Hudson in 'How To Lose A Guy In 10 Days' kind of serious. In the past 6 years of living in Bristol I have done little journalism, nevertheless, managed to travel more than I could've ever dreamed of: India, Portugal, Scotland, Thailand, New Zealand, Spain, Morocco, Bali, Greece, Ireland, Canada, and USA.
After one year of having worked in the UK's best rated portrait photography studio I decided to turn my hustling mode on big time. I absolutely loved my studio job (I still do), but the time has come to put my big girl CEO hat on whilst juggling part time studio and cafe jobs. If anyone ever needs to try a banging flat white - I'm your gal.
I've started my photography venture a couple of years ago as a sustainable fashion photographer. Sadly, the whole fashion thing didn't work out as well as expected because... well... my sense of fashion was (still is) rather off. Most days I only wear white or beige , and I spend most of my days in yoga pants. No surprise I wasn't getting commissions from Balenciaga. One of my first jobs, however, was HEARTCURE - one of my favourite ethical-vegan-activist-changemaker brands in the world, which was bloody exciting.
Nearly a year ago I got into jewellery photography. I knew there was a niche for me to get into, I just needed time to figure out exactly what it was. I've been making jewellery myself since I was little, and started my own online necklace shop Dharma Jewellery a few years ago, although it's been abandoned for over 2 years now (photos below).
I've been fully focusing on jewellery photography for almost a year (which sounds like such a short period of time, however, it feels like that's what I've been doing my whole life.) Throughout the year I've been continuously working with the most talented jewellery brands and designers:
- FIYAH-
- RUBY & JACK -
- LOREN LEWIS COLE JEWELLERY -
- BLOOMEREE-
- LOFT & DAUGHTER -
- MYSTIQUE MOON-
- ELSA ROSE BOUTIQUE -
- BIGGER THE HOOP -
- WILD & THE MOON -
- MOA DESIGN -
- LUCY ASHTON JEWELLERY -
- LILY-LIVERED by MIREILLE -
I feel so blessed that my job is not only taking pictures - I absolutely love every single aspect of having a photography brand: post-production, shoot planning, marketing, web design, SEO tweaking, idea searching, networking, managing social media, going to fairs and events, and mostly, getting to know the wonderful creative goddesses behind each brand that I work with.
So here we go, here's a little (or a lot) bit about me.
I'm currently finishing this blog post at 8:15am with a green tea scented candle by my side, a cup of banging coffee, and a New York Jazz Cafe Spotify playlist on.
Augustė