4Designers

Trip: 4Designers Conference
Purpose: Employer Engagement

This year’s trip to the 4Designers Conference turnout out to be quite a special one. Guest speakers included Jim Sutherland Founder Studio Sutherl&, Katherina Tudball Design Director The Partners (now SuperUnion), Bryan Edmondson Founder SEA Design and Jonathan Barnbrook Founder of Barnbrook. Jim Sutherland showed his designs for the D&AD annual, Katherina Tudball showed Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre and SuperUnion’s new branding, Bryan Edmondson had a message from Rakin to the conference and branding for Monotype, Jonathan Barnbrook showed work with David Bowie including album art for The Next Day and Blackstar. We also got to chat with Katherina before and after the conference, Lucy gained her as a mentor and we visited SuperUnion the following day.

“Reflecting on #4D2018 on the way into uni today and I’d just like to give a huge thanks to @andSutherland, @Tudballistic, @SEA_London and @barnbrook for 4 amazing talks and a massive thanks to the man that made it possible @mrbaglee”
Alex Crange (Tweet)

SuperUnion

Trip: 4Designers Conference
Purpose: Employer Engagement

Having met & watched Katherina Tudball’s lecture at 4Designers in London we were lucky enough to visit her agency SuperUnion the following day. SuperUnion is the name of the new WPP branding agency network that has brought together five agencies, Brand Union, The Partners, Lambie-Nairn, Addison and VBAT. The creatives we met (and introductions that were made) were with people recognised as leaders in the creative field, including Stuart Radford, Katherina Tudball with presentations given by Jonathan Brodie and Becki Sewell. Explanations regarding, process and design were given on the following award winning or globally celebrated projects – Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre, London Symphony Orchestra and Argos Simply Value Range, plus they gifted us two copies of ‘A Smile In The Mind 2’ the revised and updated copy of the original creative bible ‘A Smile In The Mind’.

“I have found this whole experience  inspiring and very moving.”
Jessica Leite

 

James Keeble

Achievements: Placement @ Havas Lynx
Progression to: Job at The Flava People

Following a chance meeting with a Havas Lynx employee, Jamie added them to the End of Year Show invite list and took the opportunity to deliver the invite by hand; securing their attendance at the show. During the show, Jamie’s contact offered a way into Havas Lynx and he sent his CV & portfolio to them. His email resulted in a two-week paid placement under the supervision of D&AD winner and creative director Paul Kinsella. At Havas Lynx Jamie impresses Paul with his creative work commenting on one idea “that’s f***k’n genius!”. Paul offered Jamie a mentoring programme with routes into the industry using his valuable contacts.

Update: Jamie is now working at The Flava People as a package designer with clients such as YO!, No Yolk and Flava~it. He recently gave an Alumni talk during lockdown on Packaging Design. Students can now watch this talk through Teams.

“It was such an eye opener, it showed me how hard you have to work.  I speak so highly of this course, if I’d gone to MMU I would never have got out of it, what I got out of this.”
James Keeble

Alex Crangle 

Achievements: TPW Placement
Progression to: BA Top-up

Through emailing the Creative Director at TPW Alex secured a placement for two years and has been working with them over the summer holidays on multiple briefs including advertising and branding projects for local SME’s and Darwin Council. As part of our Mentor programme Alex has been able to develop his relationship with TPW carrying out a live brief to brand a new company in the sports nutrition market. He has recently been offered a third-year placement this summer with TPW. Alex is an active student carrying out live work with Ribble Valley Inns, entered Penguin Designs Awards and is connected (and building) his industry contacts through his
Linkedin profile.

“The Mentor programme is a great way to get your foot in the door at a company – it really helps you engage with industry.”
Alex Crangle

Charlotte Leicester

Achievements: Fearlesss Ltd
Progression to: Job @ Fealesss Ltd

Charlotte was a confident student graduating with a portfolio which married ‘concept based design solutions’ with a ‘great eye for colour and typography’. Her competence in live briefs and client facing developed through a range of curriculum based commercial projects – seeing her working with companies such as Unity Radio, InCell and Stop the Traffik. Using this experience and confidence Charlotte gained a web publishing placement at WSP Global, which supported her second year of study. Pursuing her interest in fashion retail design Charlotte secured a full-time job at Fearlesss where she worked on the company identity, drafting the brand guidelines, creating templates for social media content and designing promotional content and digital mailers.

“I didn’t have a clue about graphics until I came here – it made me realise what my skills were.”
Charlotte Leicester

Richard Raby

Achievements: Job @ Ahoy
Progression to: BA Stockport

Richard was a methodical conceptual designer with a passion for typography and an eye for detail. During his time on the course he worked on a range of live briefs including an advertising campaign for Mercedes Smart car, an identity for The High Growth Foundation and a range of covers for the Penguin Design Awards. He progressed to Stockport for his top-up year and then gained a job at Ahoy. In order to get himself noticed he included lager with the End of Year Show invite, which promoted Ahoy to visit the show. He now guest lectures on our course introducing students to Ahoy’s methodology on Branding.

Thomas Dyke

Achievements: Job @  Divine Trash / MFS Sub Brand for UCEN (TMC)
Progression to: BA Top-Up

Thomas graduated with a strong and varied portfolio which included branding, typography, advertising, app & screen design, apparel design and illustration. Upon graduating he gained a place working in the apparel street fashion design outlet Divine Trash clothes are available at www.blueinc.co.uk. This year whilst showing applicants around the course two piped up saying they owned the T-Shirt designs displayed on our wall! They were inspired to find out that the designer of the clothes they had purchased had come from this course. During Thomas’ time on the course he also designed an identity for the Manchester Film School which has now become an officially recognised sub brand of UCEN.

Leanne McLaughlin

Achievements: Job @ Degree 53
Progression to: BA Top-Up

Leanne graduated from the BA top-up with a successful show demonstrating strong, confident, left-field design work. During her studies she worked on the re-branding of Moston Campus’ restaurant, the Purpose placement brief and developed her own zine which featured heavily at her show. Since graduation Leanne has secured a job with the award winning, 45 strong, digital agency Degree 53 who’s clients include Sofaworks, Betfred Lotto and football Acca.

Olivia Taylor

Achievements: Purpose / Design by Day / Code Computer Love / Textbook Studio
Progression to: BA Top-Up

Olivia is a rare creative talent, meticulous and imaginative who’s worked in countless places across Manchester. Her work samples are still used in UCAS presentations. She won the placement opportunity at Purpose in London upon graduation and has achieved placements in many renowned studios such as Design by Day, Code Computer Love and Textbook Studio. She is now working and living in Australia.

“
Olivia is a conscientious, enthusiastic designer with a personable nature ready to take on new ideas. I would recommend her as an asset to any design agency.”
Design Director | Purpose

Industry Guest Lectures

Achievements: 1st yrs working with @ Ahoy

This course is lucky enough to have two alumni students at Ahoy. Mark who is the MD / Founder from some 20 plus years ago and Rick a more recent graduate. Ahoy have helped consult and teach our students, giving curriculum advice and providing briefs and guest lectures. One such project became one of the key highlights for first year’s, stating that sessions held by Ahoy gave invaluable insight into the industry and how it works. This year we have been lucky enough to have contact with both Rick and Ahoy’s Creative Director David.