Rachel was born in Snow Hill in Eastern North Carolina and earned an undergraduate degree in art at Winthrop University. She married, had two sons and a daughter and lived in the Dominican Republic for ten years before coming home to return to university. She earned a graduate degree in Art at East Carolina University and taught school at Fort Bragg for 21 years before taking early retirement to paint full time in 1994.

Rachel has worked professionally in both theater stage design and as a muralist, designing sets a number of theatres and producing murals in Fayetteville, Miami and the Dominican Republic.

She's had over forty shows in North Carolina and Florida galleries and is a contributing artist and member of Cape Fear Studios.