So I booked tickets for the Graphic Design Festival Scotland workshops a while ago. I have to admit, I am now pretty gutted I didn’t have tickets for the full event as everything I have taken part in so far has been really inspiring. 
Ciaran Globel’s video was hilarious and reminded me that showcasing your work doesn’t always need to be serious. His workshop is next door to ours and looks so interesting.
I had tickets for Kelly Anna’s workshop. Those of you who don’t know, she is a London based artist and illustrator. Her work is incredible and champions strong women, particularly in sport. I’m lucky enough to have one of her prints framed in my kitchen and it is a daily reminder of her motto “never tame your game”. 
I didn’t know what the workshop I had tickets for was based on. Crazy I know, but I jumped at the opportunity to meet Kelly who is an idol of mine and I knew that whatever it would be would be inspiring.
I’ve worked in the fashion industry for nearly 12 years now and churning out graphics was part of my daily grind so when I found out the workshop was to create your own t-shirt graphic, I admit at first I was slightly disappointed because i egotistically thought I ‘knew what I was doing.’ However! It was probably one of the best workshops I could have gone to. To spend a full day on 1 graphic was actually one of the hardest things I have done for a while and was so far removed from as I said before the ‘daily grind’ because I actually had the time to design what I wanted to.
I really struggled to just let myself loose and not stick to a strict design brief. I’m so used to trying to mould my graphic work in to match a certain customers taste that I generally didn’t know what my own taste was or how for years I’ve been so uncreative.
I designed a mood board with images and colours I liked, then I started playing with shapes. I generally work in lines so creating bold shapes was tricky. I used a painting that I am still yet to finish as a marker for colour and shape and built it from there. 
Kelly (yes omg on first name terms) told us to think of words which was pretty useful. At the end of he day I had the general feel of a graphic I was happy with but no words. I thought about ‘together’ ‘feminine’ ‘bold’ ‘fluid’ all the things I think about when talking about my brand - but none of them felt right.
I went home, completely shattered from another night of bad quality broken sleep (I have a 5 month old baby) had a piece and fish fingers and had an early night.
On the way in the next day to the workshop I had a eureka moment. ‘TIME’ is a word that completely resonates with me for a couple of reasons.
First of all I have a slow fashion brand, designing and sewing made to order garments in Glasgow, all of which is a slow process that takes up a lot of time. I also have a 3 year old and a 5 month old so time is completely precious to me with them. My mum and dad both died young and I have the most crippling fear that the same will happen to me so I am constantly worried about time running out. It’s something I struggle with, I can’t even watch the tv without doing something like knitting or drawing at the same time because I feel like it is a waste!
This weekend TIME was my own. My husband took the kids to their grannies, I did no housework, I did no work work. I just created. I made time for myself which is almost unheard of. So this morning I came into the class and managed to get how and what I was feeling down on a design in about 20 minutes because it came from the heart.
I have to say I am really happy with both designs - although different it kind of conveys how I was feeling this weekend.
part of the workshop is to upload them onto Everpress. I had heard of this before but not anything about it. The concept is genius! Anyone can upload a design and if 5 or more people buy it then your design is made. This means there is no waste - no upfront costs and all digitally printed on continental t-shirts which are kind to the earth.
So please check out Everpress and look out for my design in a sea of amazingly creative graphic designers and hopefully help me get enough orders for my t-shirt to be printed - it would make my “time’ writing this blog entry worth while. (haha)
Gill xx