Expand Your Creative Process Beyond Your Day Job
As a designer, you’ve probably spent hours in studio design classes critiquing color combinations or relationships between words and images. You’ve spent more hours staring at computer screens than at blank canvases. Sure, you took some foundation drawing classes or a sculpture class, but never really went deep into the fine arts.
We train ourselves to thrive on constraints and deadlines as we refine our design process. But imagine if you honed those fine art skills a bit more. If you could paint by hand as fluidly as you can airbrush in Photoshop. Or if you could mix colors on a palette as well as you can on-screen. The artistic process can be more freeing — which is exactly why it should have a place within your design process.
Unburden your creativity
When you start opening your life to more creative freedom, you’re going to see it bleed over into your design process. You’ll feel more ambitious and better equipped to tackle those unusual creative problems at work. Maybe instead of hiring an illustrator next time you’ll draw the artwork yourself. Rather than endlessly hunting for that perfect font online and you might spend an hour making your own custom lettering. Things that felt daunting before might feel more exciting and attainable.
Take a step back from work
Being creative outside of work will give you perspective. Not every client is open to big ideas and some projects just don’t require a lot of creativity. If your day job is no longer your singular creative outlet you’ll be more focused and effective at work knowing you have the freedom to explore bigger ideas on your own and on the appropriate work projects.
Push your creative boundaries
If I haven’t convinced you yet, perhaps the most important reason to tap deeper into your creativity is to get outside your comfort zone. Meet new creative people from different disciplines, share ideas, and answer the questions you’ve never thought to ask yourself. When you do that, you open yourself up to new inspirations and you expand your vocabulary — visually and otherwise.
So this is all cute and fun, but like — how do I do this?
Schedule personal creative time
Set aside an hour or two a week to physically draw or paint something. Go to the park and add something to your sketchbook. Or pick a weekly theme and stick to doodling different variations each day.
What you draw isn’t quite as important here, as long as you’re putting the pencil (or .5mm Black Muji Gel-Ink Ballpoint Pen) to the paper. Remember not to critique yourself too harshly — the point is to get your idea onto the paper. It doesn’t need to be perfect.
Enter a juried competition
Many art galleries and centers for the arts have annual calls-for-entries. They usually have a theme or prompt to get you started… and we all know designers love a good brief! Juried art exhibits are the perfect hybrid between creative freedom and a constrained design process. Winning the prize isn’t the only goal here, the important part is to start and finish a creative project that has nothing to do with your day job.
Craft fairs
Sign up for a local craft fair. If you’re not comfortable signing up alone, ask a friend to do it with you. Sell paintings, posters, screen-prints, zines, literally anything from your visual art repertoire. Why? You like deadlines. If you commit to the show and throw down some money to enter, you won’t have a choice but to show up and sell something.
One of my favorite yearly events to participate in is West Coast Craft Fair. The first time I applied to WCC was mainly on a whim with only a few images of recent work to share. When I was accepted, I made the commitment to myself to spend all my free time in my studio (after my 9–5 job) building up my body of work for the show. It was a crazy experience that I couldn’t totally plan for — and I’m so glad I had the show to push me to make new work.
Join a collective
Collectives are groups of creatives built around the idea of sharing insights and skills with one-another. You might meet up at gallery shows and museums or maybe just meet for coffee on a Saturday morning to chat about your different disciplines. If you can’t find one that’s a good fit, create your own.
Your very own studio art practice
If you’ve done all of the above and want more, rent an art studio. It gets you out of the house, out of the office and into your own personal creative space. Fill the walls with post-its, cut out magazine clippings, whatever inspires you!
With a studio comes LOTS of questions that you’ve probably never thought to ask yourself (What do I make? Am I an artist or am I a designer? Where does my inspiration come from?) You won’t have the answers right away, but being pushed to answer them by someone visiting your open studio is a great way to start!
Start small and find what works for you
Build your creative inertia one step at a time. In my own practice, my very first step was purchasing a sketchbook solely dedicated to drawing. No work notes, no shopping lists, only doodles and sketches. Over time my process expanded from there and eventually I moved into an art studio. I’ve found that focusing some of my creative energy into my own projects keeps me feeling fresh and more inspired during my day job.
At Glassdoor, we believe in bringing your whole self to work, which includes all of the creative influences, experience, and ambitions developed in your personal life. Having a healthy creative life outside of work will make you more equipped to bring that creativity to the workplace.
