Tigerprint Gifted Competition 2013

Hey everyone! so I have been very busy recently working lots and spending time down in Plymouth for graduation so haven't been posting as much... sorry! Getting settled in now back home though so I will have more to show over the next few weeks.

For the past few years Tigerprint (who make greetings cards and gift wrap for M&S) have run a design competition for new graduates called "Gifted".

This year it ran over a whole month, each day had a new theme and you had to make a square design based on that theme. You could enter as many as you wanted but obviously the more variety you could show the more likely you were to win the prize which was a 3 month placement creating a range for Marks & Spencer.

I managed to create 13 designs and was selected as one of the commended winners (yay!) - you should check out the rest of this lot they have some lovely work :)

Anyhow, it seems like forever ago I did all of this work as it was back in July and I had to keep it secret until the end of the competition!

"Alphabet"

"Express Yourself"

"Back To Nature"

"Typographic"

"In Bloom"

"Freestyle"

"All About Colour"

"Make Your Mark"

"Spot"

"Summer"

I am hoping to release some of this work as prints and put some patterns on products soon. This may take a while as I am saving up to move out currently and working a lot but doing well in this comp is definitely motivating me to keep making stuff :)

Great British Summer Inspiration

So I have been inspired this week by the beautiful packaging Kate Larsen has been designing for M&S's "Great British Summer" range. 

Her designs are being used on a wide range of snacks, cakes, desserts and food featuring scenes of the british summertime including hot air balloons, beaches, fairgrounds and beach huts.

The illustrations are super beautiful, and I love the way she has incorporated food into them, biscuits riding a ferris wheel etc.

I got a little inspired and made this colour palette to work from and create some "Great British Summer" themed patterns: 

Also I downloaded an action for rounding corners on images which makes them look swish and also hopefully harder to steal (; 

Let me know what you think! Has anyone else been inspired by any packaging/artwork they have seen recently?

Giftware Inspiration

This past week I had some time off of work and have been all around the country, visiting some uni friends in Plymouth, family in Cornwall and then up to Birmingham today for the Autumn Fair trade show! This post is just a few photos of some of the lovely things I stumbled upon!

I went with my family to Port Isaac, a seaside town in Cornwall where they film the programme "Doc Martin" (if you like random trivia). There were loads of gorgeous little gift shops including a pottery gallery in this amazing building:

Where you could look down over from the top level into the space below. They had some amazing hand painted pottery.

There were also loads of beautiful gifts and decorations:

And today I went to Birmingham for my first ever trade show (as a visitor rather than exhibiting) to see what it was all about and get inspired by other peoples work.

The NEC in Birmingham is a huuge place, there were 5 halls filled with all sorts of commercial goods, mainly types of giftware, greetings and homeware. I stumbled upon some fun things, and we also watched a popcorn making demonstration and found a dinosaur! 

All in all a very fun day with too many amazing things to see and take in at once, some beautiful displays with varying levels of sparkliness and lights, suck uk was quite extreme:

T-rex!

Dancing sandyclaws!!!

Oh and a little inspiration for any fellow graduates who are freaking out about life right now, if this is too cringy just imagine Dory from Finding Nemo "just keep swimming" ;)

Bucket List - The art of getting started

I recently started following a blog by Lee Crutchley of Quoteskine which is entitled "The Art Of Getting Started". This blog sets ongoing assignments to get people to go out and do things, to think about things in a different way. The first 3 are as follows:

#001 - Write your bucket list 

#002 - Go for a walk and document it in some way

#003 - Take a "selfie" that doesn't show your face

You can then submit what you did/made to the blog, anonymously or otherwise. This is a great thing to do if you are stuck in a bit of a rut and need some motivation. I used it as an excuse to make myself use illustrator a little more, using it to colour the text on my bucket list :

I should probably stick this on a wall or something so I don't get lost and forget to keep working! The second I took a series of photographs of a bike ride I went on (same idea as a walk...) 

And for the "selfie" I took a picture of my current desk setup, as right now art seems to be all I am doing!

London Show - New Blood

So last week I went to London for 4 days to help set up and invigilate our uni show for D&AD New Blood. This show hosts universities and colleges throughout the UK with courses spanning many areas including graphic design, animation and illustration.

We arrived at 8.30am last tuesday to set up the show which involved making up portfolios, sticking together lots of velcro pads and lots of awkward lining up of images on foam board. I managed to drop a stack of about 100 portfolio pages on the floor which is always a fun thing to sort out... too much sleep deprivation causes silly thing to happen!

That afternoon I got to travel across London with 3 others to have a portfolio surgery with agency Phosphorart. This was really enjoyable as we got feedback about our work and got to look through some of the portfolios of artists they represent. 

We then went back to Spitalfields to get ready for the private view at 6pm - no rest for the wicked!

I didn't get a chance to take many photos but here are a few of other uni's work I liked:

We also had a wander around lots of other parts of London including Camden where I stumbled across some pretty amazing street art.

Was a great few days hanging out with everyone and looking around London, now just trying to figure out this whole job business and working on a few competitions! Hopefully I will be able to post some new work soon :)