Design advice from five sector-leading creatives
13 February 2025
Students from across our Graphic Design BA(Hons) community recently had the chance to hear the unique stories of five creatives who are doing exciting things in the world of graphic design at the ‘Design is Play’ Symposium.
Visiting Cornwall from all over the UK, the speakers were chosen for the event for their diverse range of skills to host a series of engaging workshops and talks to inspire students.
We caught up with each of them to learn more about the advice they would give to students who are looking to break into the design industry.
Luke Tonge: alumni and co-founder of Birmingham Design Festival
“My advice would be to focus on becoming excellent at the work. Don't worry about the grades so much, worry about the work itself.
It’s also important to be really engaged with industry. The great thing with the internet is that you can be very engaged with industry from anywhere. I also think it's important that the industry visits universities and does things like this symposium.
The last thing is to be enthusiastic. That can be quite hard if, like me, you are a shy student and not super confident, but I think you can show enthusiasm in lots of different ways.
If you're enthusiastic and engaged, and you have excellent work, then you stand a very good chance of getting to where you want to go.”
Jimmy Turrell: collage artist
“Collaborate with each other – especially if there are a few of you where you can support each other's weaknesses. For example, somebody might be amazing at figurative collage, somebody might be particularly good at grid-based graphic design, and someone else may be amazing at moving image. Working with each other is an approach that worked for me.”
Morag Myerscough: artist and designer
“What I advise is don't give up straight away. You might get lots of things not going your way, and that might be because you're doing work that people aren't ready for. Sometimes you might have a linear route to where you want to get, but you might have to meander a little, and come back, and in time you’ll have an extensive career in front of you.”
Marie Boulanger: typography designer
“If I had to give one piece of bite-sized advice it would be to invest your energy into positive things. I wasted a lot of energy being anxious, stressed, and scared that I wouldn't make it. I think if I had invested that energy into making useful work earlier on, I would have had more success. Invest your energy into that positivity.”
Lex Fefegha: creative coder
“There’s so much advice that I can give to students.
There's many individuals looking for opportunities at the same time as you, and there's only a small number of jobs, so one of the first things I always say to everyone is to be realistic and prepared to make your own luck.
One of the most important things for me was to look at a topic and ask myself if I had a unique perspective on it. I then considered whether I would be good at letting the world know that I have this perspective - through social media, blogs, LinkedIn, and physically going into spaces and meeting people.
Then rinse and repeat.
You have to really let the world know you exist. It’s going to be tough. But if you really want this and are willing to meet up with people and pitch your work, it will start to happen for you.”
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