Retro Surfside Collection: Vintage Beach Illustrations That Actually Look Hand-Drawn
There's a very specific aesthetic that happens when surf culture, mid-century graphic design, and tiki bar nostalgia all collide.
It's gritty. It's nostalgic. It's a little sun-faded and a lot charming.
And it's surprisingly hard to find illustrations that capture that vibe without feeling either too polished or too obviously AI-generated. So I drew some.
The Retro Surfside Collection is available now on Creative Market.
Retro Surfside Graphics Collections @ Creative Market
What the Retro Surfside Collection Actually Is
25+ hand-drawn beach and surf culture illustrations with a rough, organic line style that feels genuinely vintage.
Tiki drinks. Pin-up beachgoers. Vintage surfboards and signage. Classic coastal scenes. Palm trees, waves, retro typography elements.
Everything's black and white with intentional imperfections—the kind that come from actual pen on paper, not a "distressed" filter applied in post.
It's designed to look like it came from a 1960s travel poster or surf shop sign, because that's what I was looking at when I drew it.
Why "Hand-Drawn" Actually Matters Here
These illustrations were drawn by hand and then vectorized. Not generated. Not traced from stock photos. Not assembled from pre-made brush packs.
Which means they have the inconsistencies and character marks that make vintage illustration feel authentic—line weight variations, organic curves, the slight wobble that comes from a human holding a pen.
If you've been searching for retro beach graphics and everything looks too clean or too obviously synthetic, this is the alternative.
What You Can Make With It
Surf shop branding. Coastal apparel and merch. Tiki bar menus and signage. Beach event posters. Vintage travel-inspired packaging. Retro resort branding. Product labels with a throwback vibe.
The black-and-white format means you can drop these into any color scheme. Print them as-is for a stark, graphic look, or layer them over color for depth.
They work bold. They work subtle. They work layered, cropped, or standing alone.
Who This Is For
Designers working on coastal, surf, or tropical branding projects.
Small businesses building retro beach or tiki-inspired brand identities.
Merch designers and illustrators who need authentic vintage elements.
Anyone creating posters, packaging, or products where "beachy" needs to feel vintage, not tropical resort generic.
How It Works
All elements come as high-resolution raster files (JPG and PNG at 4000x4000px), plus the original vector files (AI and EPS for Illustrator 2020+).
Import into your design software, customize, scale, recolor, combine. Fully editable vectors mean you can adjust line weight, break elements apart, or build them into larger compositions.
Important Licensing Note
These are design elements, not standalone products. Under the Creative Market Commercial License, you can use them in original designs—posters, branding, packaging, merch—but you can't resell or redistribute the raw illustrations on their own.
That means: combining them with other design elements, text, or layouts = totally fine. Uploading a single unaltered illustration to print-on-demand platforms = not allowed.
If you're unsure about your specific use case, reach out before purchasing.
Where to Get It
The Retro Surfside Collection is available now on Creative Market.
Instant download. Ready to use.
Need custom illustration or vintage-inspired branding?
I create custom illustration systems and brand identities for businesses that want something authentic, not templated. Give me a shout.