What if the corner pub, the bakery you queue at every Saturday, or the shopfront that’s always been there, could hang on your wall as a piece of art?
Melbourne based architectural illustrator Emily Soley, the artist behind Draw My Home, opens A Love Letter to the Inner North, her debut solo exhibition, at Dear Neighbour, Fitzroy, from Friday 2 October 2026.
The show brings together an original collection of hand painted watercolours capturing the pubs, cafés, bakeries and wine bars that locals have grown attached to.
The corner pub where regulars gather, the bakery queue on a Saturday morning, the shopfront that’s been there for decades. Each piece is a portrait not just of a building, but of a place held in memory.
“This exhibition isn’t about selling artwork,” said Emily. “It’s about celebrating the places that make this neighbourhood what it is and bringing together as many of them as I can in one room.”
Originally from the UK, Soley studied Spatial Design at Central Saint Martins in London before working as an architectural illustrator at the international architecture practice Foster + Partners. What began as house portraits, sketched on the side to fund her studies, gradually grew into Draw My Home.
After relocating to Melbourne, the work came to the forefront of her creative practice, expanding from private home commissions into a wider celebration of the places that shape the city’s neighbourhoods.
Her work has developed a particular connection to Melbourne’s inner north, where she lives and works, and now spans original commissions, prints, annual calendars and collaborations with local businesses.
It has built Emily a devoted following of more than 13,000 on Instagram, drawn to her ability to capture both the architecture and the atmosphere of a place.
A Love Letter to the Inner North is presented at Dear Neighbour, a Smith Street gift store and gallery space that stocks Emily’s full print range and will feature original works available for purchase alongside her broader print collection.
“I love that people feel just as attached to these places as they do to their own homes,” said Emily. “That connection, and those memories, are really what this whole body of work is about.”
A Love Letter to the Inner North
Dear Neighbour, 311 Smith Street, Fitzroy
Exhibition: 2 October – 2 November 2026
Information: www.drawmyhomeportrait.com
Image: Emily Soley (supplied)