Tag: students

Think You Need to Have Everything Together By 21? Think Again

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No one has it together straight out of school. 

Hear me out when I say, not a single person I know has had “everything together” by 21. 

Don’t sweat it. 

We’re all juggling (though some better than others) our way through each day.

Fortunately, what you can control is what you seek to learn after graduation. You are in charge of your own curriculum. You have control over your creative potential. If you’re lucky, you can meet some really great people along the way. 

That’s one of the reasons why I love Habit Factory so much. 

Through every workshop, every push you do for yourself, you learn something new. 

You don’t need to have everything together. In fact, it’s better that you leave some room for exploration and curiosity. 

Everything I Know About Graduation

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The day I left school was the day I went into our family business full time. 

That day was the same day I learned that I knew absolutely nothing about anything, especially after 5 years of design school. 

Why?

Because what they teach you in any given academic program is so narrow. You end up leaving everything else the world has to offer on the table, while at the same time believing that you know so much because you’ve “graduated” and have a fancy sheet of paper. 

If you’ve recently graduated, or will be graduating soon, there are a lot of things outside of school that you have yet to see. Don’t let your degree fool you into thinking you’ve got everything together (by the way, it’s totally okay if you don’t have everything together. Nobody has everything together). 

Habit Factory Update

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We sat at a table to form the Habit Factory’s concept roughly around a year ago. School was just about to wrap up, until things took a huge change. 

7 months of actively working spare time on this project showed me that the Habit Factory is the most human and creative project I’ve ever worked on, and I’m excited to see it evolve with our upcoming cohort, regarding portfolios. 

We’ve hosted over 30 members so far across 4 different workshops, each one challenging and unique in its own right.

If you’re ready to join a group of others looking to make their own spot on the map, I hope you’ll check our next one out.

On Free Work

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The career opportunities I got the most personal value from were all unpaid.

I used to follow around a fashion photographer I really admired, and she let me draw her models on set as she did her thing. From there, I was exposed to “real world” dynamics of networking, and was able to bring awareness of my work to people who would then become my clients down the line.

I then took my hobby to a local fashion show where I found one of my favourite fashion designers to date, Zoba Martin, and invested my time to work with her and learn the craft of dressmaking for about a year.

Not only was I able to observe behind the scenes how something I was heavily interested in was made, but I was also able to spend time with somebody I believe in, who might not have been able to compensate for my hourly labour otherwise. 

Afterwards, I worked for free at a boutique marketing business for a number of months. This allowed me to see what’s possible and realistic with a small number of hands on the table.

I’m beyond grateful for these experiences. All of which I would not have had, had I only searched for paid opportunities where my time would be traded for money.

Crunchtime

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If you were like any regular student, you knew the feeling of crunchtime. It’s when you are aware of the amount of work you have left to do (which is a lot), and you see the amount of time that you have to do it (which is very little). 

The pressure to finish on time gets us to the finish line.

On the other hand, if there were no deadlines then none of it would matter. 

Crunchtime ramps up work speed. While it’s possible that quality could be compromised under these circumstances, things that otherwise would have been indefinitely in the planning phase actually get finished instead.

It’s portfolio season.

If you’ve been looking for a sign to get your portfolio done and ready for show, we’re hosting a 14 day portfolio building workshop. Get your website done in 14 days with the help of other creatives around the city. 

Check us out here: https://www.thehabitfactory.space/

It’s crunchtime 🙂 

Coffee, Voices, and Your Brand

Anna PengLeave a comment

Everybody is familiar with the taste of coffee.

Yet there are still a million different coffee brands around the world, each telling their own bean story or roasting process or how they want to brew the perfect cup over and over again.

The stories are all similar. After all, how many different ways can you really grow a coffee bean?

Regardless, millions still itch to tell their own coffee story, in their own voice, their own way.

Similar to a designer’s portfolio, a designer’s voice is everything. Besides the projects, besides the achievements, and the resume, your voice is one element that often gets overlooked when preparing a portfolio.

For me, I like to consider the following questions:

What do you naturally sound like to someone else?

Where are the people you want to connect with going to find you?

More importantly, are you going to be someone that other people similar to you want on their side?

Millions of brands of coffee, but we only choose to stick with a few because they sound like us.

Find your voice, tell your story.

We’re dedicating the next Habit Factory cohort to helping creatives like you build on your brand and portfolio. Find out all the information and register today at https://www.thehabitfactory.space/

It’s always a good time to invest in your own voice.

Hope to see you there.