A catch-up with one of my previous placement providers...
With Lindstrand Hot Air Balloons being based in my hometown in Shropshire and having over 25 years of success; I decided to contact the company and ask if I could join their team of designers on placement prior to starting my degree in Graphic Design (this was three years ago). I was accepted and gladly took on the opportunity to join their graphic design department for five months.
With Lindstrand Hot Air Balloons being based in my hometown in Shropshire and having over 25 years of success; I decided to contact the company and ask if I could join their team of designers on placement prior to starting my degree in Graphic Design (this was three years ago). I was accepted and gladly took on the opportunity to join their graphic design department for five months.
Lindstrand’s clients
include Churchill Insurance, BT, Virgin, Nokia, Sloggi, and they also put
together and built the concept of the flying caravan on BBC’s Top Gear a couple
of years ago.
I had an amazing time whilst on placement there, and felt
very much part of the team. My college at the time did not really have a specific
design based tutor, nor did I have the option to study design in school, which made this
difficult for me to learn what I wanted about the industry, and at the time I
remember feeling daunted by the thought of going to university and feared being
the most inexperienced one.
Anyway, this was three years ago; I guess you are probably
wondering why I am bringing this back up now?
If you are not already aware, I am always quite active when
it comes to using social media, it is such an easy way of getting yourself out
there for others to see, and perfect for self-promotion. It so happens that after connecting on
LinkedIn with the managing designer who taught me whilst I was on placement at
Lindstrand, Rene, he had got back in touch and arranged for us to meet back up to
have a catch-up. So on Friday we met up for cake and coffee, and I mainly got the chance to talk about my journey, what I
had been up to over the past three years and what I am doing now. I also had the chance to hear more about my
managing designer’s history from a different learning perspective, and we each
exchanged advice.
It was
great to finally tell someone my full career ambitions without me getting over paranoid
that I am being given the ‘in your dreams’ look. I have never actually sat down
properly with anyone and had the chance to speak about it. It did me good to
though and it made me think more about my options, and I needed to hear the
thoughts in this from a professional’s perspective.
I have now almost decided the next step I need to take to be in the design
career I want… and I actually have a really good feeling about this one. As much as I would love to take things slowly, and one step at a time, I just cannot do this... at the moment
working in two very different design jobs, learning and gaining that vital industry
experience is definitely what I need, and of course my part-time Masters degree; however, I have been looking at taking my next step down a different direction, I have been looking at the benefits of this and what I need to pursue the career I want. Parts of me are aware that things do come with time, yet my ambitions are telling me different.
What and who is to say what we can and cannot do with our career. It’s
most definitely going to take a lot to stop me on my tracks anyway.