Every aspiring artist dreams of seeing their work on display — and Sophia Fortuna is spotting hers all over Bermuda.

The 17-year-old provided a Gombey design for Hamilton retail store A2Z Fashions to put on its men’s and women’s swimwear, and the stock has been flying off the shelf ever since.

“I made my friends and family go and buy them,” Sophia said jokingly, adding that the experience so far has been “surreal” and “absolutely amazing”.

Sophia was asked to create the Gombey design by A2Z owner Angel Burgess, a friend’s mother who knew about the Smith’s resident’s artistic passion and ability.

“Mrs Burgess told me that the Gombey would be on a pink bathing suit, so I picked colours which would stand out,” she said.

“I took about three weeks going back and forth between designs, before I settled on what I thought would best fit the swimsuit.”

Sophia graduated in June from Mount Saint Agnes Academy, and at present is working as a counsellor at camps run by the Masterworks Museum of Bermuda Art. This autumn, she will head to the University of Liverpool in Britain to study psychology.

After that she plans to attend art school before hopefully finding a career which combines her two favourite disciplines.

“I would like to work in art psychology,” she said.

“It’s a form of therapy where you get children to express their feelings through art, which they may not be able to do in words.

“I’d love to see how the younger generations would do that.”

But Sophia, who counts Graham Foster and Vincent van Gogh among her favourite artists, is keeping all her options open for now.

“If any artistic opportunity comes my way, I’ll take it,” she said. “I’m excited to go to university and experience new things too.

“Hopefully I’ll get some artwork done while I’m there.”