At Street Style Sign Studio, my role has changed since I started. In the beginning, I was an associate designer, a role that helped me ease into the world of print production. However, I needed to learn quickly due to the amount of work and clients that we gained through my first few weeks on the job. I then was brought in as a full time designer to now becoming the Production/Installation Manager where I oversee the entire production and installation process from beginning to end. So far, I've built skills in the Adobe Suite and learned new applications like Onyx and Cut Master. Below are a few projects that I've had a part in and some that I've created for clients from scratch.
This project was the first that I can claim as my own. The client asked for a skyline that consisted of buildings that they've worked on like the Lincoln Center, The Spiral Building, and One World Trade Center. Throughout this process I was in contact with the client to gain information like dimensions of the space, where the piece would be placed, and working with their deadlines. The biggest change of this was how to allow this print to run smoothly since it was too large width wise, meaning I needed to separate each piece and allow for an overlap for ease of installation.
For this I took many roles: the designer, the client contact, and the main installer. This client comes to us every year with new artwork to fill the space, but in this case, this was my first experience with them, so I needed to learn quickly how it's been done in the past. After a bit of trial and error, I was able to figure out how to print and cut to make this hefty installation easier (since this was my first major large scale installation). Luckily, I wasn't alone in this installation so I had an experienced designer/installer with me. But, he was able to guide me through this process while still allowing me to take the wheel and make major decisions. This installation took around nine hours to complete in the cold, but the lessons learned were immensely helpful for how I produce major works like these now.
This project went through many iterations before we landed on a final design direction. This client needed a few components for hosting a private event, two bar faces, menus, and a serving tray that all surrounded their company style guide. However, the catch is that the event surrounded a showing of Beautiful: The Carole King Musical, so I needed to take that esthetic as well. When I started the concept phase of this, I used Chat GPT to help guide some visuals to show the client so I could get a jump start onto designing.
The client ended up landing on a "New York City/Broadway in the winter" aesthetic so once I had that, I ran with it. I began to concept designs and create these various pieces, but one concept I absolutely adored was for the long bar face. I felt like I needed to include Carole King in the design somewhere so what I decided on was an illustration of King writing the song "Beautiful" at the piano (pictured below). I am incredibly proud of this design because of the amount of attention to the details that I put into it (the music notes can be accurately read as sheet music to the vocal melody).
But, the client was not a fan of the design.
Although I was upset, I needed to put that aside since the job needed to get done. This experience taught me that not everyone is going to like the pieces I make, so take the criticism and become better because of it.
