A small studio in Strasbourg. Run by Irina.
Made for the no-phone hour.
I print tiny models of cute characters to help people unwind from long weekdays and meet new people. That’s most of it. Explore more below.
What I believe about figurine painting.
Anyone can paint a capybara.
The bar is lower than you think. I’ve never met someone who couldn’t. The first figurine is always the bravest.
Designed to be painted.
The figurines are easier to paint than they look. It’s on purpose. Large flat surfaces for first-timers, fiddly bits for the brave.
The wrong colour is fine.
We don’t judge each other. A green capybara is a green capybara. The point is to make something creative, not to make something right.
An hour or two offline is enough.
You don’t have to fix your week. Sixty minutes of brush and paint, with people doing the same, will do more than you’d guess.
How it started.
It started in May 2026, the first weekend the weather was warm enough. I brought a stack of figurines, brushes, and paints to a park in Sofia and asked a few friends to come paint with me.
We sit outside when the weather holds, and move indoors when it doesn’t. Sessions cap at 15. Usually we end up with 8 to 12 people on the blanket.
The reason I keep doing it: I already paint wedding figurines for Touche Art Mariage, and that work puts me in a quiet, almost meditative state. Phones away, hands busy, slow conversation. I wanted to share that hour with people I hadn’t met yet.
Meet the five.
The early models had no common theme. Albert began as a calm, round capybara. Irina’s husband painted one every Saturday and gave him his name.
A special café edition brought four more to the table: Bruno the husky, Colette the bunny, Otto the beaver, and Nico the hamster. Visitors started giving them personalities before we did.
Bruno even has five toes on his rear paws because of a design miscount. We kept them. The café specials became Tiny Studio’s permanent principal cast.
Who I am.
Art is my hobby, not my job. I worked in IT as a remote support lead, on the road country to country. During the pandemic I trained as a certified and accredited life coach, and ran online art-therapy classes for people in Kazakhstan. The 3D printer turned up around then, as another hobby. The first thing I printed was a figurine of my husband and me.
I keep making figurines instead of paintings because a blank canvas is hard, and a tiny printed character isn’t. You already know what you’re painting. The room to be creative is in the choices people make on it.
The other studio.
I run a second studio. It’s called Touche Art Mariage and it’s nothing like this one.
There, I make custom wedding figurines. Couples send photos, I build a digital sculpt, print it, prime it, paint it over four to six weeks.
Tiny Studio is the opposite. Pre-designed figurines you paint yourself. No four-week turnaround, no anniversary riding on it. You can show up to any gatherings, pick the character that speaks to you and create.
Same printer. Same biodegradable PLA. Same person behind both. Very different rules.
Visit Touche Art Mariage →What we are not.
To save you the guess:
- Not a class. If you learn something, great. But the point is paint, not technique.
- Not a D&D miniature shop. Our figurines are designed for painters, not war-gaming.
- Not a pottery or candle-pouring spot. The studio is mobile, we come to you.
Sustainability.
Biodegradable PLA
We print in PLA, plant-based, biodegradable in industrial composters. Not perfect, but a clear step up from resin.
Water-based, fast-drying paints
Water-based acrylics across the board. Wash brushes in a cup of water. No solvents leave the picnic blanket.
Reusable brushes
The same set of brushes goes from event to event.
Come paint with us.
Free in the park, ticketed at brunch, or we come to you.