How to be a self-taught designer. This is my story.

👋 Hi, my name is Alessio Calvo. This is a space where I share daily stories, thoughts, advice, ideas about what I’m passionate about, and what inspires me about the world of Digital Product Design.

I’m an Italian UX/UI Designer with a Web Design background and 10 years of experience, based in Rome, Italy.

This is my story about how I became a self-taught designer. I hope it can inspire your own path.

The beginnings.

It is a path that I have chosen driven by the idea of ​​being able to learn through experience. I couldn’t afford to pay for a bachelor’s degree school and so I chose to jump right into the fray.

It makes me strange to say this but 12 years ago I didn’t think about UX or UI at all but I was focused more on crop marks, layouts for printing, and logo design.

Then my nerd side led me to deepen more and more everything that revolved around the world of the web. So with the money, I earned from the first job I was able to pay for a webmaster course (when there was still this mythological figure able to do everything).

I started knowing only a few programming languages.

I didn’t know anything about JavaScript, PHP, WordPress, CMS (yes, the webmaster course was not so perfect). All this I learned when there has been the need to do it.

From there I started designing my first websites.

The thing I learned the most in that period (thanks to the person I collaborated with) was to know my limits and take advantage of overcoming them.

I was scared of not being able to achieve the goals requested by the client. But each project proved to be a step towards learning.

It was not a walk, sometimes I didn’t even sleep at night because I thought about the problems that I couldn’t solve during the day. Then I woke up the next day with many solutions.

This was the moment when I realized that you have to be aware of your limits and put all the forces available to overcome them.

Don’t be afraid.

You have to study, ask questions, try, fail, and make mistakes without any fear of being judged and above all knowing how to take responsibility.

Responsibilities that have allowed me to improve not only my workflow but also the agency itself. My boss was not at all good at organizing projects, so much so that we lost many clients for this flaw.

To make the days better and avoid the same mistakes, I tried to overcome this obstacle, creating a new process of managing projects and interactions with the client.

It is in this period that I realized that an important part of the work as a designer is the organization and correct management of the design processes.

After spending 4 years in this agency made up of only 2 elements (my boss and I) I was called by the company I work for today.

A new world. A new experience.

I went from the goldfish aquarium to the shark ocean, and like the Nemo fish, I found myself in the big dark blue, feeling completely small compared to the people on the farm.

Since that day, I have taken treasure of when I had learned until that day. Again a challenge to overcome, I had to get out of my comfort zone to discover new things.

The mentality of striving to improve every day has led me to work in a team of designers with whom I have the pleasure of comparing myself every day and from whom I always learn something new every day.

I don’t know what it means to go to a design school, I’ll never know surely I would have followed a different path.

But what I don’t mind is that the path taken so far has led me to where I want to be, on a path made of challenges to overcome where I don’t know the destination but I know that I will get there by learning step by step.

In conclusion

If you want to become a designer and you think that to become one you necessarily need an educational path, I can tell you that with the right mindset, commitment, and the desire to learn every day to overcome your limits, well I think you will get where you want to go.

There will be negative moments, of crisis, of discouragement, of insecurity, but with time these moments, because they will allow you to grow and learn.

Thank you for reading my story. We can get in touch on Twitter as I continue to document my journey. Have a good day!