Meet The Maker ~ The Top Ten
With Lines Behind
Meet The Maker is back!
In the first of this new series we meet James Dixon the man behind, Lines Behind! James creates quirky prints of the North East & beyond. We asked him our famous top ten & this is what he had to say…
1. Tell us a little bit about yourself… What’s your background?
I’m James and I’m from Northumberland. I studied in Newcastle and I like Coffee, lots of Coffee!
I’m a Designer/ Illustrator and I’ve worked in the design and licensing industry for an excess of 9.5 years with global brands such as LEGO®, Pixar, SONY, DreamWorks, BBC, DHX Media, Disney; working on projects from Beauty and the Beast packaging and re-touch, to Fireman Sam and The Trolls I’ve also worked on In-store design for Harrods, Product design for LEGO® Watches & Clocks and SONY.
I am a lover of good food and football, I also like to maintain a good level of fitness.
2. How did Lines Behind begin?
I’ve travelled the world with work, all over Europe and Asia travelling as far out as Tokyo.
When I travel, I am forever buying art to remember the places I’ve been to. When I arrived in Tokyo I couldn’t find anything I liked, so I decided to draw my own piece (Stacked Print) of the amazing city and hung it in my flat in Newcastle. Friends began to ask where I’d got it from, which spurred me on to draw more, finally opening up to me creating merchandise and accessories of places around the World and a little closer to home, the North East of England. I began to receive great feedback and started taking requests.
3. What’s the best thing about living & working in the North East?
The best thing for me has to be the people and of course Newcastle United. Newcastle hosts great culture and sights, every time I walk along the quayside it just gets better and better!
5. Describe your workspace
My Workspace is quite tight knit, with greetings cards all over the place! I always like to work on the move, so I love a great coffee shop or café where I can just dock up with one of my many spotify playlists and be able to crack on!
6. Who do you look to for inspiration?
Inspiration comes from all over. I like to look at design blogs daily, a lot of my inspiration comes from Travel accounts on Instagram, forever saying “I need to draw this place and I need to visit this place…” Check out @beautifuldestinations on Instagram, one of my favourite feeds. Inspiration flows all the time, I enjoy making people laugh and being witty in my work.
6. What’s the favourite part of your job?
I like how everyday is different, I like a challenge and I like to feel in control. Design can be good or bad, it’s all about opinion.
7. What’s the hardest part?
The hardest part has to be colour for me. Forever picky. Oh, and forgetting shortcuts in Illustrator and Photoshop, ha ha!
8. What’s your bestseller?
As a Print, my bestseller has to be ‘Tynemouth’, but hey, why not? Tynemouth is simply stunning!
As for cards, my bestsellers are my witty typographic North East cards, ‘Ask Ya Mam’ for example.
9. What’s the most exciting thing that’s happened to Lines Behind?
I’ve done various commissions, for the likes of JAM JAR in Jesmond & the owner of the Post Box Café in Ponteland which have both been printed on a grand scale but my all time favourite has to be smashing my first order of 1000 cards. There’s no better feeling and it hasn’t stopped since!
10. Where can we find your products?
You can find my products all over Northumberland, Willow Home and Gift, (Morpeth) The Bonny Hoose Company, (Alnwick) Patrick Forster Barber Shop (Newcastle) 61 upside down presents (Newcastle) For The Love Of North (Whitley Bay) North East Gifts (Online) That’s Champion Pet (Online) to name a few….
Oh and… www.linesbehind.com of course!
Thanks James for being the first off the block with our second series of Meet The Maker.
If you’re a Maker, Designer, Artist or Creative living & working in the North East, who’d like to join in with our Meet The Maker, series then please get in touch at hello@brilliantlysocial.com
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