About KARAWOJO ART
The family behind KARAWOJO
KARAWOJO ART is a family publishing studio built from four names and four imaginations.
- KAKadriya
- RARyland
- WOWolfred
- JOJoe
Together, we are KARAWOJO.
Kadriya grew up in Russia. Joe grew up in America, speaks Spanish, and developed a love for other cultures through travel, including significant time in Colombia after college. Together, they're raising Ryland and Wolfred in a home where English, Russian, and Spanish can all have a place — and where discovering another culture begins with curiosity.
KARAWOJO grew from that world.
Art before KARAWOJO
Kadriya's mother is affectionately known in the family as Baba Z. She is an artist, and she has drawn and painted throughout her life.
Kadriya remembers growing up in Russia with paintings, brushes, colors, sketches and art materials always around the house. Art was not a special event. It was part of everyday life.
Baba Z and Kadriya have collaborated creatively on ideas including the horse and ship collections. They both love drawing horses, and have always been fascinated by their movement, strength and beauty.
Yashka becomes Yozik
When Baba Z was a little girl in Russia, she had a real hedgehog named Yashka. Yashka lived with her, ran around, and particularly loved finding things to eat.
Many years later, that childhood memory became the inspiration for Yozik, the Story Tailor of The Birchwood Tales.
A real little hedgehog from one generation became a storybook character for another. Yozik now helps carry stories from grandparents to parents to children.
Yashka was Baba Z's childhood pet. Yozik is the character he inspired.
Creativity runs in the family
Kadriya grew up surrounded by Baba Z's paintings, brushes and colors. Now Ryland and Wolfred are growing up surrounded by drawings, crayons, stories and books.
Ryland loves drawing, especially cars. He also loves building and helping.
His favorite Birchwood Tale is Teremok, which fits him perfectly: a story about creating a home together and helping one another.
Wolfred loves art with considerably fewer boundaries. If Wolfie finds crayons, almost anything can become a canvas.
Paper is preferable. Furniture and doors are apparently still under consideration.
The mess is real. So is the creativity.
Wolfred's favorite story is Kolobok, especially because of all the animals Kolobok encounters.
Joe loves Kolobok too. He is American but has always been fascinated by Russian culture, and has embraced the stories Kadriya grew up with.
Two cultures, three languages
Language is another important part of the KARAWOJO family story.
Kadriya grew up in Russia and brings Russian language, childhood stories, folklore, and traditions into the family.
Joe is American and speaks Spanish. After finishing college, he spent significant time traveling in Colombia and other parts of Latin America, developing a connection with the language and culture.
Today, Kadriya and Joe want Ryland and Wolfred to grow up curious about languages beyond English. Russian connects the boys with Kadriya's childhood and their grandmother Baba Z, while Spanish is another language the family is intentionally introducing to them because of Joe's experience and connection with it.
This is why KARAWOJO's children's collection naturally includes books in three languages.
The goal isn't simply to teach vocabulary. We want children to experience another language through pictures, stories, play, coloring, and time spent together with their families.
Every book starts somewhere
The books may look very different from one another, but there is usually a real memory behind them.
Montenegro → Ships
Our family trip through Montenegro — the Adriatic Sea, coastal towns, boats, mountains and views — became part of the inspiration behind Timeless Ships & Coastal Dreams.
The book was also developed creatively with Baba Z.
England → the countryside
An English Pastoral Romance was inspired by experiences visiting England and falling in love with its landscapes, villages, gardens and atmosphere. It is Joe's favorite of the adult collections.
New York → fashion
After moving to the United States, Kadriya often visited New York. She became fascinated not only by formal fashion but by fashion on the street — people creating their own combinations, confidence, individuality and personal style.
Gothic architecture
Kadriya loves Gothic architecture: the windows, stonework, scale, mystery and centuries of stories contained in old buildings. That fascination helped inspire Gothic Cathedrals & Sacred Architecture.
The ocean → fantasy
Kadriya has always loved imagining what might exist beneath the ocean, and likes to believe there may still be mysteries we haven't discovered — mermaids, Atlantis, forgotten underwater worlds. That imagination helped inspire KARAWOJO's underwater and fantasy collections.
Horses
Kadriya and Baba Z have always loved drawing horses. Their movement, strength and beauty became the inspiration behind Majestic Horses.
Rooms worth getting lost in
Moroccan Interiors came from the same pull toward beautiful places — tiled courtyards, carved doorways and quiet garden rooms.
Four names, one family
Kadriya grew up surrounded by Baba Z's paintings, brushes and colors. Now Ryland and Wolfred are growing up surrounded by drawings, crayons, stories and books of their own.
KARAWOJO is one family's imagination passing from one generation to the next — and being shared with other families.
Four names. One family. Generations of creativity. Endless worlds to explore.
Three kinds of book
37 titles in print, in three lines that grew out of each other.
Coloring books for adults
12 titles, each built around somewhere worth spending an afternoon: Gothic cathedrals, a sunken Greek city, tall ships and lighthouses, Moroccan riads, botanical plates, an enchanted woodland. Detailed line work that rewards an unhurried hand, printed single-sided so the page you spent an evening on doesn't have another drawing on the back of it.
Bilingual activity books, ages 3–5
21 titles pairing alphabet tracing with counting, mazes, shapes and coloring, themed so a child who only wants dinosaurs can have dinosaurs. Editions for English, Russian (А–Я) and Spanish (A–Z + Ñ) learners.
The bilingual editions read second language first — in a “Russian Alphabet for Kids” book the Russian is the big line on the page and the English sits underneath it. That sounds like a small decision. It is the whole difference between a book that teaches Russian and a book that translates it.
The Birchwood Tales, ages 3–8
4 bilingual picture books — Kolobok, Teremok, Repka and Ryaba — classic Slavic folk tales retold for bedtime and painted in watercolour. Every page carries English and Russian together, so a grandparent and a grandchild can read the same book in different languages at the same time.
You can read the opening pages of all 4 here before you buy anything.
How they are made
Every page is composed and reviewed before a book goes out, and anything that doesn't meet the bar is redone rather than shipped. All 37 titles are paperback originals, printed on demand so nothing sits in a warehouse, and sold on Amazon.
Start anywhere
12 adult coloring books, 21 kids' activity books and 4 storybooks — with a free 3-page sample from any title.
Or start with free printable pages.