When Dorota Linke moved to Bermuda, she had her sights set on becoming a gardener.

The lush landscape and colourful flowers were worlds away from what she was used to in her native Poland. However she quickly learnt that the career she had in mind wasn’t available to her as a non-Bermudian.

The 32-year-old moved here a year ago after her husband took a job at Ernst & Young.

“I thought for three months, what can I do here?” she asked.

In December she started drying flowers she had picked along the Railway Trail and in January she made her first flower portraits — colourful renditions of a butterfly and a dragonfly.

Ms Linke said she doesn’t know where the idea came from.

“I was out walking and when I saw all the flowers and I thought it could be a good idea.

“First I dried them in the microwave,” she laughed.

The results were “good” but she learnt it was better to dry them between sheets of paper with an iron set on low for just a few seconds. She was encouraged by the results.

“I saw that every next picture was better,” she said.

Her pressed flower art now has a small following. Prints and originals are available at the Bermuda Arts Centre at Dockyard and her Etsy shop. A limited edition set of prints can be found at Reid Street boutique Atelerie.

They follow a classic island motif — parrotfish, treefrogs, jellyfish, herons, seahorses and the shape of the island — but Ms Linke takes custom orders of any design.

Her favourite is the bougainvillea for their durability and intense colour. They’re also excellent for drying, she added

“They reflect the colours of the island,” she said.

“Now I’m waiting for new flowers after the hurricane. I have a good supply in the fridge,” she laughed.

Her creativity has always put food on the table.

While she was getting her bachelor’s degree in anthropology in Warsaw, she had to earn money and quickly found a job at retail giant Zara.

She began in sales but was quickly promoted to window dresser and travelled to stores throughout Poland for three years. When the stores updated to the more modern, featureless mannequins, she saw opportunity in the retired models. Their hair would be perfect for rag dolls.

“When I was a child, every kid had a rag doll. I started to make dolls and clothes,” she recalled.

She confessed she found it “frustrating” making clothes.

“They can look good from one side but not the other,” she said.

The dolls allowed for imperfections.

In 2011 she began focusing on the custom figurines full-time — bespoke dolls that looked like their owners.

“When I put the first pictures up on Facebook, everyone wanted the dolls,” she told Lifestyle.

“I began getting contracted to do personal dolls. I was making two dolls a day. I probably made 2,000 of them.

“It was a great job because it made people happy.”

Each one came with a birth certificate. She sold the mini caricatures through her Etsy page Szmacianki, meaning rag dolls, and is still fielding requests from across the Atlantic.

“Every day I get e-mails,” she said.

Right now that work is on hold. The high cost of living on the island makes it difficult to produce the dolls at an affordable price.

“It’s not easy here, but for the pictures, I don’t have to buy the flowers, I can collect them when I’m not working,” she said.

Earlier this year, she entered a giant floral portrait of Frida Kahlo in a competition at the BSoA. She has a doll to match.

“It’s easy to do her,” she said. “She’s so distinctive. I like her style. I like that she was an outsider, an individual.”

She works out of her Southampton kitchen, a much neater operation than her workshops in Poland where she “had fabric everywhere”.

‘This is like meditation for me. Even more so than the dolls. Sometimes dolls were frustrating, the sewing machine, but pictures are very relaxing. I can listen to music and be with my dog.”

She grew up learning how to be handy. It was the end of Polish People’s Republic and tough economic times.

“My mother taught me how to sew and I have always sewn things for myself,” she remembers. “It was a difficult time. We couldn’t buy clothes. It was the end of communism. Every woman had a sewing machine and made clothes for herself. People in Poland at the time had to do things manually and by themselves.

“They couldn’t buy new things because there was nothing in the stores. I love Bermuda. It’s so optimistic; the colours, the sun. In Poland, it’s totally different. It’s so grey, so dark and cold.”

www.etsy.com/people/szmacianki

•Prints $29, Originals $140-$370, available at Atelerie, 9 Reid Street, Hamilton; The Arts Centre at Dockyard; or on Etsy.

Instagram: @dorotalinke and @szmacianki