Inside the vibrant and inspiring home of Cherie Clonan, a proud Autistic woman and founder of The Digital Picnic

Welcome to this week's Home Life Series, where we're excited to explore the vibrant and inspiring home of Cherie Clonan. Cherie is a proud Autistic woman who, along with her loving husband and two Autistic children, has created a home that is as unique and inclusive as she is. 

Cherie, founder of The Digital Picnic, a trailblazing neurodivergent-inclusive digital agency, has channeled her deep understanding of neurodiversity into both her work and her home. Her creative and empathetic nature shines through in every aspect of her life, from her dynamic marketing agency to the thoughtfully designed spaces in her home that cater to her family's diverse sensory needs. 

Cherie really is one in a million, and her positive energy and outlook on life is truly addictive. Read on to get your daily dose of feel good content and colour-living interior inspiration!

Hi Cherie! It was an absolute pleasure meeting you - you truly are a ray of sunshine! For those who may not know you, can you tell us a bit about yourself and who lives here with you? 

Too kind, dream team! Hi! 

My name is Cherie, and I’m a really proud Autistic woman raised by a solo parent Autistic Dad [the kind of Dad I’d wish on everyone. He’s my literal best friend]. I’m married to a good man who I met when I was 19, and we now have x2 kids together [both Autistic]. 

I am a 41 year old creative native who has worked within marketing & comms for 15+ years now and I’m so passionate about the work that I do. Mine is the kind of brain that’s always seen life in content, and stories, and storytelling in general… so I can’t believe I get to call what I do “work”. 

I own my business, and employ a legitimate dream team, so I feel like one of those pretty lucky humans who can genuinely say “I love my life” and really mean it.

You founded The Digital Picnic, a market leading digital agency, in 2014 which has been growing from strength to strength. What motivated you to step outside of your previous roles and start your own neurodivergent inclusive digital agency? 

The push to begin my own marketing agency came from the deep understanding that the large majority of agencies prioritise profit over people, and I wondered if it would be at all possible to - low and behold - treat people like people, and prioritise profit and people. 

Mine is an agency that goes above and beyond for its people in ways I know so many other agencies [and workplaces in general] would never, and could never. It’s taken me x10 years to realise that what I consider to be a “bare minimum” is a real “rare minimum” in most other places. 

And then the drive for me to create a neuroinclusive workplace came from knowing that if I have the lived experience of being a neurodivergent woman, the absolute bare minimum that I can do for disabled communities and neurodivergent communities would be to design a workplace that is truly neuroinclusive at as many different touchpoints as possible [if there’s a touchpoint I’ve not yet made inclusive, it’d be a case of not knowing better in order to do better: the minute I know? I do].

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Could you share your personal experience with neurodiversity? How has it shaped your approach to fostering an inclusive and supportive work environment and how important is it for others to promote accessibility in the workplace? 

I never like to romanticise disability [there are so many parts of being an Autistic woman moving through a world that’s designed for the neuromajority as opposed to the neurominority, and a lot of that feels truly disabling], but there are many parts of my Autistic culture and identity that feel like legitimate gifts that I don’t like to take for granted: hyper empathy, hyper creativity, intense pattern recognition skills [particularly when it comes to people], the deepest love and respect for animals, and a sense of justice that probably should have seen me working law for humanitarian organisations, tbh [lol]. 

How has all of this shaped my desire to create a truly inclusive workplace? I don’t know anyone within my beloved neurokin community that has it in them to exclude instead of include. People like me? We’re just built to include, because we know how it feels to be excluded. 

The best workplaces are the truly diverse workplaces: look around. If you’re in a workplace where everyone around you looks like you do, thinks how you think, talks like you, and agrees with everyone? … you’re hangin’ out somewhere homogenous, and artificially harmonious. Nothing truly great, or high-performing, comes from anything homogeneous or artificially harmonious.

You are refreshingly honest and open when it comes to sharing the ups and downs of running a company and being a mum – how important do you think it is for leaders to share their reality and experiences with their community? 

I cannot tell you how deeply satisfying it is for me knowing that I might be the reason someone stopped their scroll > landed on my content and has a quiet little moment where they think “oh my God, I thought it was just me?!”. I love the community, connection, and safety that comes with authenticity and transparency… and it’s also a most stunning antidote to loneliness.

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Supporting others is in your DNA - a day doesn’t go by where you are not trying to help others. What can you tell us about the apartment you fund for people experiencing domestic violence, and how can we help? 

My company’s “secret apartment” is - without doubt - one of the proudest moments I’ve had as a Founder. So we rented an apartment that we then gifted to a NFP here in Melbourne/Naarm, and they then made it available to folks who are escaping domestic violence. I grew up in a DV home [my Mother was the perpetrator of that violence, which is uncommon, and my Dad is my forever hero for plucking my sister and I out of that environment and raising us solo every day since: he saved our lives]. 

Kids like us crave to make an impact for folks going through something similar, and now - thanks to TDP - I get to be a small [but mighty] change catalyst within the DV space. The best part? We ended up sharing this story on social media, and it went unimaginably viral. As a result, x3 large organisations within Australia saw that post and donated 91 [!!] apartments to the same NFP. How good is social media for social good?!

Let’s talk about your incredible home, full of life, colour and vibrancy as we expected! There are various elements and spaces designed to calm and stimulate the senses, making it a relaxing haven for you, your kids, and guests. Could you walk us through some of these sensory tools and explain how texture plays a significant role in your styling? 

I’m absolutely obsessed with designing a home to suit the varying sensory profiles/quadrants/needs of the people who live within my home [all of us? Neurodivergent. All of us? … incredibly different sensory needs]. 

My daughter? An incredibly tactile sensory seeker, who needs to move fast, and feel deeply, and regulates by swinging, and spinning, and being upside down, and stimming, and chasing regular [fast!] movement, think: sensory swings, and monkey bars, and trampolines, and things to regularly crash into etc. 

My son? Sensory avoidant. He needs dim lighting, and peace and quiet, and quiet places to retreat to as a deeply introverted, sensory avoidant human. He is easily over-stimulated, so he needs retreats like his gaming room [all black, black wall panelling, almost no lighting apart from low LED etc.] to escape to in order to regulate. 

As for me? I’m more like my son than my daughter: I chase peace, and quiet, and reading nooks to hang out in for as long as possible… and then my dopamine deficiency and sheer adoration for colourful decor has me filling this home up with as much colour as humanly possible [I feel like I’ve only just begun. #lol]. We all - collectively - like bright, colourful, soft, and fluffy, so, uh, thanks for existing Kip & Co. #lol.

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We have to get the low-down on your daughter’s slithery friend! What were your first thoughts when she came to you asking for a pet snake? 

Forever inspired by my own Dad, who spent my entire childhood passionately pursuing my Autistic special interests with me? … my daughter has had a x5 year long SpIn [this is short for “special interest”] in snakes. 

Something you might not know about Autistic wellbeing is that a huge chunk of our wellbeing is attached to being able to regularly explore our SpIns, and so x5 years into my daughter’s snake SpIn? I knew this particular SpIn was more of a long-term thing, and so because I want to forever prioritise Autistic wellbeing within my home… the natural next step felt like welcoming “Marlow” to our home. 

She’s the most incredible “snake Mom”, and I love that my kids are growing up acutely aware that if it matters to them? It matters to me. If they’re passionate about something, I’m passionate about it. And so… I live with a [God damned, lol!] snake in my home, ha!