​Lou Heiser attended the Chicago Art Institute and later studied oil painting while pursuing a degree in architecture at the University of Illinois. He has had a successful career as an illustrator in Chicago, and has designed houses not only in Leelanau County, Michigan, but nation-wide. Lou and his wife Lynn were awarded Country Living Magazine’s House of the Year, and five of their homes have been featured in national publications. Lou has studios in Leelanau County and Tuscon, Arizona. Being an illustrator was a wonderful experience and a superb training ground for my landscape painting. Unencumbered by deadlines, oil painting offers many freedoms and a third dimension, that of texture and brushwork.