Continuing our series of blogs, our newest recruit, Aydan Kelly, gives us an insight into his first couple of months as a Junior Creative Artworker and gives us a sneak peek at some work in progress.

When I had my interview for my role here at DWH, the first thing Dave did was give me a brief and ask me to come up with as many logo ideas as I could within five minutes. I looked at sketches and figured that there was either no way I was getting the job, or I would really have to pull the rest of the interview out of the bag.

After talking for a while about the company, and the kind of work that is done here, primarily the idea that there would be potential to work on projects from start to finish, I was really wishing I had pulled off some better sketches during that task. So, needless to say, when I received the call to say I had got the job, I signed the contract as soon as it hit my inbox.

GUIDES, GUIDES AND MORE GUIDES!

It feels as though a lot of time has passed since then, as I have worked extensively on multiple projects since I started working at DWH on 5th of February. The majority of time during my first month was spent tirelessly working to meet the deadline set for us to complete 30 interactive guides about cryptocurrency for Coin Rivet, which had to be ready for launch before the end of the month.

Despite looking at guides all day every day for almost a month, I’m still not entirely sure how cryptocurrency works or whether I should be asking for my wages to be paid in Bitcoin. However, I did learn a lot about how DWH works as a company, and the importance of attention to detail and the relationship between us and the customer. Nothing leaves the office before it has been gone over with a fine-tooth comb to ensure that it is up to DWH standards and we can be sure that it does exactly what it’s intended to—and looks good doing it.

CRYPTO WITH ADDED SPICE

Coin Rivet also approached us to design a website for a company they were in talks with called Crypto Curry Club. The brief for this was fairly broad, so we were able to have a bit of fun with it. Drawing on the Indian themes, we came up with the idea to use a mandala, created in-house by James to sit front and centre of the page. I created a colour scheme from photographs of traditional Indian spices. This gave the site a very bold but elegant and almost traditional feel, which really brought the design together.

TAKE A WALK ON THE WILD SIDE

As I said earlier, one of the things that initially got me excited to work here at DWH was the prospect of taking projects from start to finish by myself. One of the examples we spoke about during the interview was a client who had approached Dave for a complete brand and website for a new company set to take people on hiking trips in the UK and overseas, which would be called Wild Hikes Company.

Alongside the guides for Coin Rivet, I began working on formulating a logo that would go on to influence the entire brand. I knew this would be rolled out onto a website at the very least, but also business cards, clothing etc. We needed something that was impactful, memorable and clean to work across the board. Knowing this, I began trying to form a somewhat minimalistic icon that could be rolled out through a range of media.

Once we found ourselves on a route that we were happy with for the logo, and went over it with the client alongside some other branding ideas, I began work on website concepts. I have these in a constant state of refinement and they are on the cusp of being ready to go live . This is a project that I feel has produced some really strong visuals and has the potential to grow into a very strong brand overall.

SO FAR, SO GOOD

These projects are only the tip of the iceberg of work I have been a part of since starting here at DWH. I’ve been constantly learning and growing in my knowledge and ability with design, and I hope there will be many more projects to come.