RI Originals was created in 1972 as a family business, featuring the pen and ink artwork of Marjorie J. Vogel. Marjorie held many diverse jobs, including Bed and Breakfast owner in Narragansett, RI, where she began pursuing a full-time art career in 1987.

Marjorie accepted commissioned work throughout her career, including completed commissioned works for clients including The Smithsonian and US Capitol, the Jimmy Carter Center and the Houston Grand Opera.

Marjorie traveled widely, studying art since the 1960s, with advanced training and experience in art including the Philippine Women's University, Chinese painting in Manila, General Art studies at the Ecole Des Arts, Senegal, Sculpture in St. Petersburg, Fla, and Printmaking in Houston, Texas. She finally settled in RI, and received certificates in Architectural Studies, Rendering and Perspective Drawing, Archeological Illustration,and Delineation at the Boston Architectural Center, RISD, and Harvard Graduate School of Design, respectively. She lived and traveled extensively in Norway, Africa, Philippines, Europe, India and the Far East, and Russia.

Her "mapmaking" career started with a commissioned City of Providence town poster in 1985, followed by posters of Rhode Island locations including Narragansett, Wakefield, Peace Dale, Chariho region, Wickford, and North and South Kingstown. Marjorie's work showed her meticulous research and attention to accurate detail--for example, she visited Wickford, England in order to add drawings of Wickford, RI's sister city to the North Kingstown, RI poster, which took 4 1/2 months to create and produce.