We arrived in St. Petersburg, Russia and were rescued from the airport by Yulia and Tatiana, our key instructor and her student. It felt like a rescue since we arrived here after 1:30am after a very long travel. Thank you both so much! What would we have done if you had not been there for us!

After a good night’s sleep, we were able to hit the streets and explore this beautiful city. Here are just a few photos of what we saw… I feel so fortunate to have this experience!


It is now the 2nd day of classes and things are going very well!  Everyone has so much passion for the craft and great talent to add. The class space is so nice with tall ceilings and architectural details that add in the creative inspiration. By the looks of the works coming from the classes everyone is getting into the creative flow! Beautiful!!!


We are so happy to see the familiar faces and joyed to meet so many new members of the DECO family of instructors!

It is a great honor to have the support of Olga Petrova and Yulia Kornukova, two of DECO’s most prominent instructors in Russia.

Olga came to Hawaii a few years ago to study the DECO curriculum; it was immediately apparent that her skills would take her very far. After intensive training she brought these skills back to Moscow with her. It was a perfect fit for the culture here and soon had a large number of students attending her classes. One of these students was Yulia who took many lengthy trips from her home in St. Petersburg to Olga’s Moscow school to master these techniques. Yulia was able to apply her great handskills, passion for the DECO techniques and amazing personality to soon have full classes of eager students. Both Olga and Yulia have a great understanding of the DECO philosophy and maintain the standards and principals; for which we are so grateful.  Thank you both for your honest dedication and enthusiasm!

Sorry this blog was so short…I must get back to class… More to come…

Yukiko