Tag Archives: art department

Bag of Books or Bricks, Part 2

19 Sep

Unlike M2’s heavy school bag, when I was in high school, I remember I would try to avoid bringing any text books to school. I simply didn’t want a heavy backpack to deal with and even conspired with my friend who sat next to me to share the textbook, blatantly defying the teacher who specifically said no sharing. We basically took turns to bring the Math textbook to school.

Sometimes we will leave our subject text books in school or even hide them in the class cupboard! Ahhh… those were the days.

When it came to college, thank goodness for me being an art student for I did not have much text books to lug around. But I had art materials though and I did have a locker at the Art Department to keep my supplies. And this helped especially during winters when I had to trudge through the snow.

Sometimes situations today trigger those nostalgic memories. Sigh…

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I Have a Room

7 Feb

Throughout my professional career as a Graphic Designer/Assistant Art Director/Art Director/Design Director, I have never had a room of my own in the office. Maybe because when one works in a design studio or art department, these places are open concept environments.

At least it was like this for me in all the places that I have worked in. In New York City where I interned and then worked at, WBMG., Inc. was an open concept design and I had a drafting table in the organized design studio. And I must admit I modelled my own studio like their setup when we first started our company.

Then in Adweek, the old office on 23rd Street was also open concept and I had a drafting table amidst other drafting tables of the rather chaotic setup of the art department. Only the Editor had a room if I recall. When the company moved to their new place on Broadway and it was more organized, I had a cubicle workstation.

Although the cubicles were quite high, I could still yak with my colleagues. Now come to think of it, even though I may not see them because the cubicle system obstructed my view, I could still talk to everyone in the whole art department!

The next work place, a publishing house in KL was also the same with an open concept setup. No room, just a table and sufficient to work.

Then my own design studio. Open concept too. But after all these years of being in an open concept work environment, I now find myself having a room at our new office! A definite first for me.

And I think I kinda like it simply because I get to display all my toys in a more organized manner than anything else! They now have a wall to lean against without crowding my workspace. In an open office, it wasn’t easy to surround my space with plushies, my array of display-worthy collectibles and gum ball machine but now, I can do it! Nice.

Plus I can play my choice of music (Michael Buble! yay) without disagreement from the team. So having a room for a change is nice, very nice.

Together

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