The unexpected pleasures of returning to employment from freelance life
If you’re a long-time reader, you’ll know that in 2012 I had a personal meltdown, quit my full-time design job, went travelling, grew a project called CycleLove into a fairly...
Graphic Design
Honest life and work advice for graphic designers. It’s easy to let off steam about clients down the pub on a Friday, but what if you have a bigger or more personal issue that’s troubling you as a designer? My writing about graphic design is intended as a safe place for you (and me!) to explore our feelings about the design industry.
Self-care for the Creative Soul
Last month I was invited to speak at Creative Mornings in Edinburgh on the theme of “taboo”, and decided to talk about mental health and self-care for the creative soul....
How did you know you wanted to be a graphic designer?
It’s hard to pinpoint the exact moment I knew I wanted to be a graphic designer. Like a lot of people, I think the job found me, rather than me...
5 ways to be a graphic designer without losing your sanity
Recently I’ve stumbled into a rich seam of freelance work… one of those sweet projects thats grows into three or four with the same client, and a healthy working relationship...
Alternative careers for graphic designers: the complete guide
If your design job has lost its shine, and you want to explore alternative career options, read on. I can probably guess why you’re here… Being a graphic designer is...
Emails that get designers fired
Simple rules to help designers write better emails. And why you should never email in anger.
10 things that graphic designers get stuck with, and 10 books that can help
Often as a graphic designer it’s not the design process itself that causes problems, but everything on the periphery.
Just enough design
A recent discussion on Designer News about well-designed portfolios made me smile because this website was included in the mix.
How to fire a client
When a normal relationship goes sour, you start to feel guilt and resentment. And often you leave it too long before taking action for fear of hurting the other person....
7 lessons about blogging you can learn from The Oatmeal’s Matthew Inman
Until a few weeks ago I had no idea that Matthew Inman — the man behind one of the biggest comics on the internet — was once a web designer. ...
In conversation with designer-turned-writer Paul Jarvis
Writing doesn’t come easy — and anyone who tells you otherwise is lying. Canadian designer Paul Jarvis is one designer who has found a way with words, writing for the...
Why names rarely match up with faces on movie posters
This has been bugging me for, oh I don’t know, a decade or so. I thought perhaps it was a running joke in the movie industry, like the Wilhelm Scream,...
8 questions to ask a client before designing their website
You've beaten off the competition and are ready to start designing a shiny new website for your client. Awesome. But now what? Of course it's tempting to dive straight into...
Frankensteining — when graphic design turns fugly
I don’t know how long it’s been this way, but it seems to be standard practice in the graphic design industry these days to present three design routes to clients. ...
Dear graphic design (an open letter to the profession which I thought had broken me)
You were the career which I chose blindfolded out of a hat when I was eighteen, before I even knew what a real job was or what a graphic designer...
WordPress theming: tips and tricks for designers
At some point in 2005, just as my interest in Flash was starting to wane, I caught scent of a fresh-faced blogging platform called Wordpress. Not knowing any PHP at...
10 simple ways to improve your graphic design
1. Look outside of graphic design for inspiration. Using the likes of Siteinspire, Designspiration and Dribbble is fine and dandy if it's just for 'reference'. But if you start reproducing...
I’m thinking of chewing off a limb. Is it a good idea?
If you think I'm going to answer the question above, I'm afraid that you've got the wrong blog. However — on a similar note — earlier today someone send me...
A freelance graphic designer’s survival guide
Whilst I'm still dead set on quitting being a graphic designer, I'm still extremely grateful for having an in-demand skill set that I can fall back on when money gets...
How to stop being a graphic designer — redux
Towards the end of last year I let forth an angry rant about being a graphic designer onto the internet with little expectation of a response. I’d had a nervous...
On not making cool shit for Bjork or working for minimal techno DJs in Berlin
When I was fresh out of art school and recovered from the shock that people weren’t physically lining up to employ me at my degree show, I went on the...
My first website
Remember the dulcet, gurgling tones of a 56K modem connecting over your phone line? I can’t think of a more evocative sound from my early online adventures. Apart from an...
Trust your internal bullshit detector
A generic business estate on the outskirts of town. A generic office building. Generic office spaces lined up neatly inside. (Are these places cloned somewhere? Maybe that's what Milton Keynes...
Eike König on the importance of fun in design
Without a doubt, this was the most energising design talk I saw last year, courtesy of Berlin-based studio HORT and the creative conference 'Here' organised by creativity uber-blog It's Nice That.
Daniel Howells on lessons learned from redesigning and redeveloping siteInspire
Try and ditch Photoshop and Illustrator if you’re making a web app. siteInspire is hardly a complex design but I didn’t touch either once apart from creating assets. Having no...
How to stop being a graphic designer
If you're a designer and love your job, stop reading now. This article is not for you. But if being a graphic designer is getting you down, you need to...