Designer Profile: Jeff Raum

Jeff Raum
Jeff Raum Stencils
Moorpark, CA

Stencil designer Jeff Raum has followed a colorful career path. After receiving a B.F.A. in commercial design, he worked as a scenic artist for animated TV commercials in New York City, eventually becoming an art director. He later became a Broadway make-up designer, working with such stars as Bernadette Peters. After moving to Los Angeles, Jeff began his own business, Jeff Raum Studios, creating murals, trompe l’oeil, and stenciling for clients that included Gucci, I. Magnum and the Las Vegas Hilton.

Jeff first began designing stencils because he couldn’t find the designs he was looking for. After a 1998 article featuring some of his work was published in SALI’s Artistic Stenciler magazine, he began receiving phone calls encouraging him to market his stencil designs.

Included in that SALI article was a photo of an urn with ivy in a niche. After reading the piece, Jan Dressler called Jeff and said, “I thought, someone out there is making some beautiful designs, and then I read the caption and saw they were mine.”, referring to the niche and ivy stencils, which were from her own collection. Jan later recommended Jeff for the “The Christopher Lowell Show“, and he went on to appear in eight episodes.

The most striking feature of Jeff’s stencil line is the amount of detail and the quality of the drawing. “I put a lot of time into breaking the design into overlays so that the work is already in the stencil, making it easier to get a professional look.”, says Jeff.

Jeff loves historical design and images that harken back to another time or place. His stencil collection includes some wonderful Architectural designs, Oriental Stencils, and Trompe L’oeil Stencils for murals.

Jeff tells me he rarely gets to see what people do with his designs after they purchase them. “I wish they would send me images”, he says.