Aqua Ivy shared their story and experiences with us recently and you can find our conversation below.
Aqua, a huge thanks to you for investing the time to share your wisdom with those who are seeking it. We think it’s so important for us to share stories with our neighbors, friends and community because knowledge multiples when we share with each other. Let’s jump in: What is a normal day like for you right now?
A normal day for me right now is a mix of planning, creating, and trying to keep everything organized as I grow across different platforms. I usually start my morning catching up on messages and checking how my content performed overnight, then I map out what I need to film or edit that day. Most days I’m bouncing between Twitch streaming, working on ASMR ideas, shooting new photos, or organizing upcoming posts for my newer brand, ThiccDuchess.
I treat it like a real job with its own schedule, but there’s still a lot of creativity and experimenting involved. Some days I’m fully focused and other days I’m running around trying to finish five things at once, but I love that there’s always something new to work on.
Can you briefly introduce yourself and share what makes you or your brand unique?
I’m Aqua Ivy, a full-time content creator and streamer. Most people first discover me through Twitch, where I do a mix of gaming, ASMR, and community-driven streams. Over the past year my platform has grown a lot, and with that growth I’ve been expanding creatively in different directions.
One of the biggest projects I’m working on right now is ThiccDuchess, a new branch of my brand that focuses on body-positive creative content and more stylized photo sets. It’s been exciting watching it build momentum, especially on Instagram, and seeing people connect with a different side of me creatively.
What makes my work unique is that I’ve always built everything myself. I come from a digital arts and game development background, so a lot of what I do—whether it’s editing, world-building, or the way I approach storytelling—comes from that skill set. I share my journey openly, the highs and lows, and I think people relate to that honesty.
Right now I’m in a phase of growth and rebuilding, taking everything I’ve learned since my first interview with you and turning it into something bigger. It’s a lot of work, but I’m proud of how far it’s come and excited for what’s next.
Appreciate your sharing that. Let’s talk about your life, growing up and some of topics and learnings around that. What was your earliest memory of feeling powerful?
I think the first time I ever felt truly powerful was when I was about sixteen, in art class at my private school. My teacher back then was this eccentric, unpredictable, inspiring woman who pushed us creatively in a way I had never experienced before. Her class was the one I looked forward to every single day.
She assigned us this huge canvas project, literally five-by-five feet, and told us to create a piece of art based on a simple pear sitting on a table. I remember staring at that pear for what felt like two weeks straight, sketching, erasing, starting over. Nothing felt right.
One day, by complete accident, I dropped my compact mirror and the glass shattered all over the floor. When I looked down, the broken mirror reflected the pear in all these fractured, distorted pieces, and something clicked. It felt like it mirrored the way I was feeling in my own life at the time, put together, but not really.
So I leaned into it. I painted this huge oil painting of the pear and then spent months cutting pieces of mirror and arranging them on the canvas like a puzzle, creating something that looked shattered but intentionally beautiful.
When the class finished, my teacher displayed everyone’s work in the window of the interior design studio she lived above. People loved all the pieces, but mine ended up being the only one bought by an art collector in New York. I’ll never forget that feeling. I realized in that moment that something I created could move people, could mean something. That was the day I decided I was going to be an artist, and honestly, I’ve never stopped.
Was there ever a time you almost gave up?
Yes. When I was eighteen, I came very close to giving up on everything I loved creatively. My family home burned down after it was struck by lightning. I wasn’t there when it happened, but I’ll never forget the drive back. I lived out in the country, so the roads were pitch black at night, nothing but trees and fields. As I got closer, I started noticing this faint orange glow in the sky. By the time I made the last turn, the entire landscape was lit up like daylight. Our house was engulfed in flames.
I remember parking the car and running toward my dad, and that sickening feeling when the reality hit me: every piece of artwork I had ever created—years of drawing, painting, sculpting—was gone. All the pieces I was working on at the time were gone too. It felt like everything that defined me had been erased in a single night.
For a while, I honestly questioned whether there was any point in creating again. It felt like starting over from nothing, and it was overwhelming. But eventually I realized that losing the work didn’t mean I lost the ability to make more. I had to rebuild, not just physically, but as an artist and as a person. It took time, but that moment ended up shaping a lot of the resilience I carry with me today.
Alright, so if you are open to it, let’s explore some philosophical questions that touch on your values and worldview. Is the public version of you the real you?
I would say the public version of me is absolutely the real me, just expressed in different ways depending on the platform. On Twitch, I’m a gamer first. I’m loud, I’m silly, I get frustrated, I joke around, and that’s genuinely who I am. It’s the place I feel the most at home because I can be completely transparent. If I’m dealing with something in my personal life, whether it’s financial stress, family things, health struggles, I don’t hide that. My community appreciates that honesty, and sometimes those conversations help other people open up about what they’re going through too. It feels really human and grounding.
On Instagram, I share a more creative, stylized version of myself. My photos are colorful, whimsical, and a little bit magical. That’s just another part of me, the side that loves fantasy, cosplay, and building worlds through visuals. It’s not fake; it’s just a different lens I enjoy creating through.
Behind the scenes, I’m honestly not much different than what people see online. I care about being transparent. I never want my content to feel like a performance or something manufactured for views. I want people to connect with me because they enjoy the energy, the creativity, and the personality, not because I’m pretending to be someone else.
So yes, the public me is very much the real me. Just in a few different fonts.
Thank you so much for all of your openness so far. Maybe we can close with a future oriented question. When do you feel most at peace?
I feel most at peace when I’m creating, and for me, that usually means streaming on Twitch or working on one of my fantasy photoshoots. Streaming has this calming effect on me because it’s the one place where I can show up exactly as I am. I get to play games, laugh, talk with my community, and just exist in the moment. It sounds funny, but even on the chaotic days, Twitch feels like home.
And on the other side of my life, building out fantasy photo concepts brings me the same kind of peace but in a different way. It’s quiet, intentional, and creative. I get to dream up entire worlds, pick colors, experiment with lighting, and bring a little bit of magic to life through a single image. It’s one of the few times my mind isn’t racing, ’m just fully in the process, and it feels good.
Those two spaces, Twitch and my fantasy photography, are where I feel the most grounded, the most myself, and the most at peace.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://beacons.ai/aquaivy
- Instagram: https://instagram.com/thiccduchess
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@aquaivy
- Other: Twitch: https://www.twitch.tv/aquaivy/
Kick: https://kick.com/aquaivy
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@ivy7cats
Image Credits
Image Credits: All images created and photographed by Aqua Ivy for ThiccDuchess
