From My Heart to Yours: The Story Behind Raw Canvas Skin + Wellness

They say the path to your purpose is never a straight line. Mine was tangled with heartbreak, grit, grace, and a relentless fire that wouldn’t let me give up. What started as a whisper became a vision, and what was once a treatment room in a basement is now a space where healing, skin, and soul come together.

This is the story of Raw Canvas.

I always had an eye for beauty long before I could even name it. As a little girl, I was the one styling everyone’s hair, doing their makeup, brushing eyebrows into place, and dabbing on whatever lip gloss I could get my hands on. I found joy in creating beauty everywhere I went. I would line up my friends like clients, giving them “makeovers” as if I owned a salon in my bedroom. I even gave my poor cat a few questionable transformations, cutting her whiskers and taping her ears down, thinking I was perfecting her look. I couldn’t help it, I was obsessed.

Beauty wasn’t just something I admired, it was something I lived. It was ingrained in me.

And I used to say, over and over, “One day, I’ll have a shop.”

When I was just 18 years old, I gave birth to my daughter, Taylor. I graduated high school seven months pregnant, terrified, tender, and uncertain of what the future held. But then she arrived. angel baby. She didn’t just make me a mother. She gave me direction. She saved me. She became the reason I kept going when the world felt too heavy.

Not long after, I enrolled in the part-time aesthetics program at Blanche Macdonald. I didn’t know exactly where it would lead. I just knew that beauty had always lived inside me. I wanted to understand skin. I wanted to deepen my knowledge. I wanted to build something that was mine. Something that would carry meaning. Something that could live beside the little girl who made me who I am.

I earned my certification, and over the years, I worked in spas and salons not because I had to, but because I truly loved it. But my full-time role was always being Taylor’s mom. I was a wife, a stay-at-home mother, and the heartbeat of our home.

After years of fertility struggles, in 2012, I gave birth to my son, Cache. Long before I ever carried him, I felt him. I used to say, “I have a son I haven’t met yet.” It was a knowing I couldn’t shake, a quiet truth I carried in my heart.

Just like the shop I always said I’d have long before I knew what it would look like or what it would offer Cache was a vision. A calling. A soul I felt before he had a name.

Both my son and my clinic were born from the same place.

A whisper.

A waiting.

A deep rooted pull toward something that was always meant to be mine.

And when he finally arrived, he completed something within me. He was not just my baby he was my becoming.

But in 2014, my life changed forever. I went through a brutal divorce. I had never worked a corporate job in my life, and suddenly, I was a single mom with a baby on my hip and a teenager at home. Cache was just one and a half. I had no safety net. No backup plan. But I had two reasons not to fail. And a fire under me that wouldn’t let me quit.

I stepped into the medical aesthetics industry full-time, working in sales from 2014 to 2018. I traveled endlessly, worked 16 to 18 hour days, and knocked on doors with broken heels and a tired heart. I walked into clinics soaked from the rain, wondering if I’d hit my quota, if I could make rent, if I’d ever catch my breath. But I showed up anyway. I pushed harder than I thought possible.

In those years, I learned everything. I built deep industry connections, and I saw clearly what was missing: education and real results. People were being sold treatments they didn’t need, with devices that didn’t work, by people who didn’t understand skin.

In 2015, Taylor began struggling with painful, cystic acne. As a mother, it shattered me. As a professional, I was determined to find a better way.

Then in July 2016, while renting a home, I was sitting on my couch one afternoon exhausted, uncertain, and searching for answers. Taylor’s acne was worsening, and I felt helpless as a mom. At the same time, my corporate job had just changed its commission structure, and I was struggling to stay afloat. I was doing everything I could to support my kids, but it never felt like enough. I knew I had to do something to create a new path forward. I needed to start a side business to bring in extra income, to help Taylor, and to take back some control over our lives.

I remember sitting there, wondering what I could possibly call this business I had swirling in my head. That’s when I looked over at a blank canvas sitting on the table beside me. I stared at it, and something stirred deep inside. “This is what beauty is,” I thought. Raw. Honest. Unfiltered. Just like skin. Just like us.” That moment birthed not just a name, it birthed a calling.

That was the day Raw Canvas was born.

I transformed a small room in my basement into a treatment space and began seeing patients in the evenings offering derma-planing, micro-needling, chemical peels, and journaling their progress. I was still working full-time, but something deeper was forming.

In December 2016, I moved into my first owned townhouse and reimagined that space giving Raw Canvas a real room and a deeper sense of purpose.

Taylor’s acne persisted, so I began taking her to one of my client clinics for Laser Genesis treatments. I watched her skin improve. I began treating my rosacea and couldn’t believe the results. It was then that I asked myself:

“What if I bought a laser? Could I really do this?”

In December 2017, I made the biggest investment of my life. I bought my first laser.

I continued to work from my townhouse clinic while still maintaining my corporate job. Raw Canvas began to build momentum with every treatment, every patient, every breakthrough.

By May 2018, I was finally able to walk away from corporate and step fully into Raw Canvas.

That summer, while driving through Fort Langley with the kids, a place that’s always felt like home I saw a new commercial building going up. Taylor had gone to school nearby, and we’d always loved the community. I called my realtor girlfriend and asked, “Do you think they’d allow a clinic there?” When she said yes, I knew it was time.

I purchased the space and hired a contractor to begin the buildout while continuing to treat patients out of my townhouse until the clinic was ready.

From August 2018 to January 2020, I poured everything into Raw Canvas: my heart, my savings, my vision. Every decision was made with intention. And in January 2020, we opened the doors to our first official brick-and-mortar clinic.

Three months later…COVID hit.

The world shut down. But we kept showing up. We stayed connected. We stayed honest.

We built trust not through flashy marketing but through real results and relentless integrity. Because at Raw Canvas, the first treatment is always skin care. We don’t guess. We don’t treat prematurely. We build the skin from the barrier up using pharmaceutical-grade skincare and customized plans that transform skin from the inside out.

Our patients trust us deeply because we walk with them. That’s why they come back. That’s why they send their families. That’s why we now treat clients all over the world.

Raw Canvas isn’t just a clinic, it's a community.

And now, we begin our most exciting chapter yet.

Taylor, my daughter, the reason this all began is now by my side. After her own skin healing journey, she became a certified holistic nurse and now leads our internal wellness division. Her focus is hormone balance, gut health, and IV therapy supporting true, radiant beauty from the inside out.

That’s why we renovated.

This wasn’t a facelift. This was a rebirth. A physical, emotional, and energetic transformation that reflects everything Raw Canvas has become and everything Taylor and I believe in.

This new space is soft, intentional, and thoughtfully designed to mirror the purity of my daughter’s spirit. Her energy brings a lightness to the clinic. A calm. A belief in healing from the inside out. She sees people deeply. And now, her presence infuses every corner of this space.

What started as two small rooms with one laser has now expanded to four thoughtfully curated rooms, a growing team of specialists, and a full-circle approach to skin and wellness. The walls that once simply held services now hold energy, purpose, and possibility.

We’ve expanded our offerings not just for growth but for alignment. For depth. For results that go beyond skin.

• Taylor’s Wellness Services: Hormone testing, gut mapping, IV therapy, whole-body healing

• My New Offerings: Facial sculpting, lymphatic drainage, buccal massage, Gua Sha, tone-focused facials

• Luxury Skin Treatments: With Biologique Recherche, the most iconic skincare line in the world natural, medicinal, deeply researched, and completely transformative. BR is the yin to the yang of ZO Skin Health. Where ZO is clinical and corrective, BR is healing, intuitive, and sensorial. Together, they embody the full spectrum of skin wellness.

• More rooms. More purpose. More layers of healing.

And none of it none of it would be possible without my team. They are not just staff. They are the soul of this place.

• Blair, my right hand and work wife, who holds me up on the days I forget how far I’ve come.

• Sarah, our organized visionary and my very own Martha Stewart, whose precision anchors us. My best friend.

• Lisa, our creative spirit and brand manager. My life long friend of 20 plus years. 

• Lucy, behind the scenes  the artist of the backend.

• Barleen, our weekend warrior who lovingly packs every single box and order with care.

• Katie, the mother of the clinic, grounded, nurturing, and always there to make us feel held.
  

• And Mike, my husband. My home. The man who supports every wild idea, every sleepless night, every high, every low. His belief in me never shifts. His love makes all of this possible.

And to my children, Taylor and Cache my heartbeats.

You have watched me struggle. You’ve seen me cry in moments of fear and exhaustion. You’ve felt the stress I tried so hard to shield you from. But you’ve also stood by me with quiet strength, grace beyond your years, and endless love.

You are my purpose. My why. My everything.

Every long day, every late night, every risk I’ve ever taken was for you.

This clinic is not just a business. It’s my family’s heartbeat.

It’s my calling. My daughter’s calling.

It’s a legacy of healing, connection, and coming home to yourself.

I built this for my children.

For the little girl I used to be.

For every patient who walks in hoping to feel seen.

But Raw Canvas would not be what it is without you.

To every single patient who has trusted me with your skin, your story, and your transformation—thank you.

You are the reason we’re still here.

You are the reason this place feels like home.

Some of you have been with me since the basement.

Some found us just last week.

But every one of you has helped build this.

You’ve let me into your lives.

You’ve sat in my chair and shared your truth.

You’ve referred your sisters, your daughters, your friends.

You’ve allowed me the privilege of holding space for your confidence, your healing, and your beauty.

And now, as we open our doors again with more intention, more purpose, and more heart I welcome you home.

This is Raw Canvas reborn, reimagined, and ready for what’s next.

Where beauty meets wellness. Where skin is everything. Where you are always home.

With love and endless gratitude,

Amanda Connolly

Founder | Master Skin & Laser Specialist | Educator | Mother | Dream Builder