Claire O'Halloran

When we visited New York we got the opportunity to visit Sterling Brands which was brilliant, I remembered that we were given a set of business cards at the end so i thought it would be a great opportunity to dig them out and contact the company to ask a few questions. The company is a large firm that specialises in brand design and brand redesign and is spit into two department with the design team and strategy team. I reconnected with Claire to remind her of our visit in November and asked her if would be okay to ask her a few questions, below is the email i sent with Claire's answers in blue.

Emma Hamilton

As I am nearing the end of my second year I have started getting in touch with practitioners to arrange portfolio visits and to enquire about the industry. As I will be fresh from university when i leave i thought it was a great opportunity to contact an old friend from when I lived in Bristol. Emma graduated in Graphic Design when I started and spent a few years doing odd jobs before finally putting her efforts into finding a design job. I thought she would be a perfect person to ask about those all important steps to becoming a designer as someone who still has it fresh in their mind! below are a few questions i asked her and what she had to say..

Em's reply:

Craig Oldham (Music)

As we have begun to finalise our portfolios I have begun to contact agencies for potential portfolio visits:

Chris Jeffreys (Thoughtful)

Following Thoughtful's presentation I stayed behind to speak to both Stuart and Chris about how they felt the presentation went and what they thought needed improving. After that I contacted Chris to set up a portfolio visit.

Luise Vormittag (Container Plus)

After our cross pathway project I contacted Luise Vormittag as a thankyou for inspiring me to create the 3D image of Central Park

JP Winter (Very Studio)

From my placement at STEEL I was able to pick up a few contacts. JP at Very Studio was one of them:

Jon Furse (STEEL)

After my time at STEEL I took the opportunity to contact some of the people I had been working with for contacts for further placement places.

STEEL London

I have been lucky enough to secure a two week placement at a digital communications agency called STEEL London, My sister was in close contact with the manager of the company which gave me a fantastic opportunity to ask for work experience. I originally expected just a week but have been offered two weeks, which i am very excited about. Although digital communication isn't initially where i would begin to look for work experience i think it will be really interesting to see how the company works. STEEL seem to have a large team with a separate creative studio, which is where i will be based for my two weeks.