Friday, May 25, 2007
Since graduating from Hyper Island, Linda Gavin (Leow during the time at Hyper Island) has made choices that might be unconventional for a successful designer. Linda tells us more about what her life is like, running her own company, cunsulting and living in Berlin.
- Since my style is so particular, I have chosen to broaden the area I work in so that I can do fun things all the time. If I had chosen to do what most Hyper Island students do and worked my way up in a company, then jump from company to company doing the same thing, I would have never have ended up doing what I really want to do. This way I've been able to make packaging design, magazine covers, the Twitter logo, game covers for EA games, a Nike campaign and a promotion game pushing for cellphone Flash games for Adobe. Mostly I work with web projects, but I see design as design independent of which media it's for.
- I want to live a fun life and be able to spend a lot of time with my hobbies and want to work with fun projects. Therefore I've chosen to work by myself. It's important for me to work in a creative environment where I have full control of my life. When I step into an office the feeling of control and creativity disappears. The sterile environment and hierarchies makes me very unhappy. I want to live in my own bubble and have fun. If I didn't, my life would be meaningless.
- Eventually I'd like to move in to a studio where friends could gather and work on projects. I'm not interested in starting partnerships with anybody but would like to have friends around for more stimulation. Being able grab lunch, play console games together, grab a beer after work and dream about bigger, more fun projects with othes. Kind of like we did during my time at Hyper Island. I really miss that sometimes.
- Berlin is the perfect city for me. Time passes slower here and I feel that this is the only city where I can be myself. Everything is non-pretentious and there are an endless number of chill-out places to hang out at. The low pulse and the filthy charm makes the city inspiring for me. Things that's so important in Sweden like careers, an awesome flat and being fit, healthy and beautiful are of no importance in my Berlin. The life here is more about living the life to the fullest and be happy.
- I love my life, my job and my city and I know it's going to get even better with time. This is how it feels to be happy and I'm grateful that I get to experience it.
- One hobby, a side project of mine is running an online-shop FakeBlondie.com and I make doll clothtes for Asian doll collectors. It's very new so all I have so far are clothes for Blythe and tiny Bjd's, but I'll extend the line to MSD-sized dolls in a near future.
- I was asked to think of something to say to future students. I think you should embrace the feeling of your first weeks of the education and preserv that positive energy. That will take you far! Work hard and have fun while doing it!
Thank you Linda!