Hello swimmers and welcome back to the pool party.
It's been a damn long minute since we last talked,
so I'm so stoked to be able to share with you today
a podcast episode that I recorded in December with India.
India is an art director,
a graphic designer living in New York City.
She graduated from Parsons School of Design
and has a background in computer science.
She is an all-around creative who follows her intuition,
loves Pilates, and previously interned with Rick Owens.
So I'm stoked to bring you this conversation with India.
And before we dive in,
I wanna give you a little personal update,
but since it's been a minute,
I do wanna give you a live update.
I think especially after listening to this episode,
I've decided to go to New York and I've planned my own trip.
So as of right now, I'm planning on being in New York City,
crashing in Brooklyn from March 26 to early April.
I don't have a date yet when I'm coming back to Boise,
but I will be.
At the moment, I am leaning on friends,
other artists and creatives
who wanna do a design tour network
and essentially explore the joy of the city
without really having to move
and live there for a long period of time.
So that's where I'm at right now.
I am going through changes in work at the moment
and really trying to find joy in my work,
cut out the things that are seriously sucking my energy.
And it's not always easy.
I have to taper these things out.
I have to DJ my life.
And so that's something I've been thinking about
and editing these podcasts and listening to India
just reinforce how important this is for me.
So I hope you enjoy listening today.
And if you have any suggestions or comments on the podcast,
please let me know.
I'm going to start posting these on Substack as well.
So if you would like to follow me on Substack,
you absolutely can.
My Substack is available in the bio
and you can also find me with my username at JulesPools,
J-U-L-E-S-P-O-O-L-S.
And of course, if you're looking for design art
for your business as an artist, creative designer,
writer, podcaster, et cetera,
you can find my work at JuliaEspero.me,
J-U-L-I-A-E-S-P-E-R-O.me.
Okay, let's dive into today's episode.
Welcome to the pool party.
I'm so excited to have India on today.
She is a art director and India would love for you
to tell me a little bit about your background
and what got you into art direction.
Hi Jules, thanks for having me.
I started at the beginning of this year, January 2024
to freelance.
I have a background in fashion marketing.
I studied an associate's degree
at Parsons School of Design in New York.
That's what got me to New York
and I'm now currently living in New York.
I wanted to go into more like art direction
and creative direction for fashion brands
or fashion campaigns.
But then when I was looking for a job,
other opportunities popped up
and I started doing way more graphic design,
which is something that I've always been interested in,
especially layout design.
But life takes unexpected ways
and now I find myself doing so much branding
and brand image.
So yeah, in between graphic design and art direction,
I also love to curate the brand image
in terms of art direction.
Now I'm figuring out where I wanna go from here.
I don't think I wanna be in graphic design
for a long time.
I think I'm leaning more into the art direction field.
I was looking at the work you did for Isla Pilates.
So tell me a little bit about that branding
and the brand overall
and how you got involved with this Pilates studio.
It was like a project that I did
like literally finished two weeks ago.
And it's one of the projects I'm most proud of.
So for reference, for the audience branding,
I decided like logo, the whole look and feel,
photography and colors for this Pilates studio
that's gonna open in Rome in 2025.
The girl who founded Isla Pilates,
I met her in New York inside a club.
We initially connected because she was working
in a company that I wanted to work in.
She moved back to Rome and called me
because she wanted to open a Pilates studio.
The whole idea was that she went back to Rome
and there was no Pilates studio like the ones in New York.
She's like, I wanna build something that is cooler
and it has a luxury experience that we have in New York.
I wanna build a community and bring all those things
that a New York Pilates studio has to Rome.
I was really excited about the project.
This is my first project in Italy.
It was big for me.
I've been working mostly with clients based in New York.
When I get passionate about something,
it's so easy to get ideas out.
I have my whole archive of photos and modes.
I selected a specific mode
and put it together.
The whole part of the branding is this dot system
because I found this dotted font on Adobe.
I was like, this is so cool.
I can create a whole language with these dots.
That's the overarching theme.
With the founder, she was like,
I want a very elegant font to go with it.
Then it's a play of putting all those pieces together
and make it work with the mood and the dots
and the elegance and give that feeling
that she wants it to be looks very modern
and something completely new to Rome.
Mm-hmm.
Which club did you meet at?
It's called Outer Heaven.
And it's in downtown Manhattan.
I opened two years ago.
It's a very small club.
I've never been before.
I used to live in Brooklyn and around Manhattan,
but I haven't been back to New York in two years.
So Outer Heaven is, that's good to know.
That's the thing about New York, it changes so much every year.
I want to ask you about your experience in New York
because I know that you lived here.
I did some internships in New York prior to the pandemic.
I think 2016 was the first year I was in New York.
I could get a room in Soho for $700.
And it was insane.
I lived above, I think it's called the Grey Dog in Soho.
It was really lovely.
I would go to hot yoga and hot Pilates
in the Lower East Side like every day,
and then just go to galleries.
I was interning at this nonprofit called
Storefront for Art and Architecture.
This little pizza slice gallery in Soho.
But they do these really cool architecture activations.
A lot of the people I worked with were European post grads.
I think they just wanted to spend the summer in New York.
They were fun to hang around and they were always late to work.
They were always late to work.
Yeah, and then I lived in Bushwick one summer,
which was probably like 2017.
That was a great experience too.
I just went out a lot elsewhere, some of the typical suspects.
And there was like some warehouse clubs too.
I would meet people on Tinder back then
and they would just tell me to like some random address.
And then there was a band playing or something.
So that was kind of fun.
I love that.
Yeah, New York, I feel like everybody tells me
I came here after the pandemic.
So I never really got to see it before.
And everybody tells me it was so different.
And the city has changed a lot, but I wouldn't know.
I came here in 2022.
I want to know, where do you meet people these days?
For work, outside of work, what is there to do?
Right now, I live in New York and my routine has changed a lot
since I first arrived here.
Right now, I go to this yoga studio every day,
which is called SkyTang.
I've been going there since I arrived,
because I knew them from before.
And I was doing their online platform before.
And when I moved to New York, I was so happy to go in person.
And I'm really big on yoga.
I just do it every day.
I go there every day.
And it's such an incredible community.
I know the teachers.
I know other members and a lot of my clients.
I got through SkyTang just from talking to people
and being connected to other people.
And then this yoga studio, there's a lot of creatives
that go there.
So sometimes, I need to connect to another creative.
For example, one time, I connected with this girl
that did the website for SkyTang that I really admired.
She has a creative agency.
And I DMed her on Instagram.
And I was like, hey, I know you did the SkyTang website.
You want to come to a class with me and then get a coffee?
And that's literally what we did.
And then she connected me to other people.
So for me, that space has been incredible.
And from thing, another thing gets born.
And it just never ends.
That's one place where I meet a lot of people.
Then I have my brother lives in the city as well.
And he's super, super social.
He introduced me to a lot of people.
When I first arrived to New York,
so that's like another whole community,
which is more European that I get to meet.
That's the amazing thing about Instagram
is that we're all so connected
and we all know what each other does.
And the crazy thing is when you go to a proposal,
someone you want to text,
and you see all the other people that are linked to them,
it's so easy to text one of these people and be like,
hey, I know you know him.
Can you like hook me up for work?
Especially, I do that a lot.
Like on Instagram, email,
I try to network with a lot of people I admire.
People don't get about networking
is that it should feel fun.
And it's also nice to do it
through people you know already.
It's not like you have to be on LinkedIn
and talking to a void or something,
which you could do,
but I think sometimes it doesn't land very well.
I don't really use LinkedIn.
And I think in the creative field,
Instagram is what has worked for me the most.
And also emails,
you go on a website of someone
and I literally did it two weeks ago.
This guy did this branding project that I loved.
He's Australian, like completely different worlds.
And I wrote to him,
I was like, your project is just incredible.
It was the best start of my morning.
And he replied,
I asked him, I would love to talk to you
because motion design is something I wanna get into.
He was so happy about it.
And I was like, I'm so happy it resonates.
Let's find some time to chat.
We're humans and we're meant to connect.
It doesn't have to be so scary.
I'm looking at Skyting, their website too.
I really love it.
Who's a creative director of this website?
Like the creative direction of Skyting.
I think it's more from the founder.
And then the website was developed by Human New York City,
which is this creative agency specialized in web development
and the founder, Rachel,
she's the most kind human being ever.
So nice.
She connected me with other creators
and people in her team and just so kind.
Is your brother Luigi?
Yeah, and I texted him.
Yeah, we were the same class at Stamps.
I was in New York.
I was actually, I think we went out like a big group of us,
but I definitely have hung out actually at his apartment
while he was DJing.
So that's so fun.
So random, I texted him this morning,
like a juice, I think she was here in Stamps.
But yeah, and he was like, yeah, I remember her,
but he's not here right now.
Tell me about some of your favorite work experiences
because I saw that you did an internship at Rick Owens.
I feel like that is like a dream for some people.
How was that?
Yeah, that was the best time ever.
At that time I was in university.
I was in Milan.
I did my bachelor in business economics and computer
science.
And my last year of uni, I was like, I hate this.
I'm going to finish this because I cannot finish something.
But I was like, this is a lot.
And I didn't love my class.
And it was just like not my ideal environment.
So I was like, I want to work and study on my own
and just take my exams.
I really pushed for that.
And so my last year of uni, I tried
to look for an internship to do full time.
And I always loved the fashion world.
And through my father that was working in the fashion world,
I managed to get an interview with the Rick Owens
shop in Milan where they had e-commerce as well.
In the Milan store, they have the retail store.
And then they would have the e-commerce in the office
behind the shooting.
And I had an interview, and it was just the perfect timing
where they were looking for someone to help out.
It's extra hand, like pure internship,
like whatever needed to get done.
I was going to do it.
And it was the best I've ever.
Like, I would wake up in the morning, and there are 10,
and you had to be dressed fully Rick Owens, which is,
it was one of my favorite brands since I was a kid
because my father used to have a shop, like a women's wear shop,
and he used to sell Rick Owens.
I was in love with Rick Owens since I was eight.
And yeah, it was really a dream come true.
I was doing a lot of back end e-commerce,
using my computer science skills and coding, updating
their supplies.
But then I would also do some retail in store
because it's a luxury experience when
you go to a Rick Owens store.
So they need to have one sales assistant per customer that
comes in.
So sometimes we would run out of people,
and I would have to be a sales assistant.
And it was super flexible and fun.
And the people in there are always so eclectic,
and I loved it.
One thing I love that you mentioned
is that you did not start out in fashion or graphic design
at all.
So you went into your education studying computer science,
and you just realized it wasn't for you.
Is that basically what happened?
Yeah, I think it was a slow process.
When I was finishing my bachelor in computer science,
the first six months of my last year,
I did the internship at Rick Owens.
And then the second part of the year, I did an exchange program
and I went to Australia with the school.
And I had to pick courses, of course,
that would fulfill my remaining credits in computer science
or business.
And then I had a bunch of credits
that were choose what you want and an elective.
And so I picked this visual communication design class.
And I had to sell it to the university like, oh,
this can be part of my marketing side of my degree.
But they accepted it, so I ended up
doing this very creative course in Australia,
which was part of the art school, completely unrelated
from my bachelor and what I was studying.
And that's when I fell in love with graphic design.
And it was this specific project of layout designs or designing
a magazine that made me think, wait, I can actually do this
as a job.
I would always collect and read magazines, especially fashion
or lifestyle magazines.
And I never thought about who's behind this, who's actually
putting all these elements together, the text,
the pictures, and deciding how it comes out.
And that was the first time that I was like, oh, wait,
this is a job.
But then when I came back from Australia,
I took some gap months, and I was traveling so much.
And then I came back to Europe, and I
was looking for a job in the fashion.
So I'm trying to pivot in marketing, but fashion industry.
And I didn't find anything.
And then this opportunity came up in a consulting firm,
and I was going to do marketing.
And I was like, OK, that's close enough to what I want to do.
And I feel like the opportunity was so good.
They were going to put me in a very good position.
It was not an internship.
I would start a proper full-time job,
and I was going to fill up this role that this lady that
went on maternity leave.
And I was like, I can't say no to this.
This is a great opportunity.
So I started doing that, even if it wasn't fashion,
even if it wasn't creative and COVID hit.
And I was in that job for two years and a half.
And I think it was the best case scenario.
I learned so much, and it was more of a corporate environment,
even if it was a boutique agency.
Learned so much about marketing, and then ended up
doing some computer science stuff and customer relationship
management and Salesforce.
I went back to the computer science things.
And then after two years and a half, I was like, I'm done.
Yeah, and it's nice because you don't ever lose your skills.
And sometimes they come in handy.
I think sometimes people think you
have to really follow through with what you choose
to study as an undergrad.
There's really more options for getting more education,
like you did, or asking your program
to allow you to take another course and count it.
Coming from the Bay Area tech scene,
so many people are dead set on going into tech or consulting.
And for me, after school, I was like,
I'm going to try doing this graphic design
boot camp in New York.
That was really healing for me because it
was just so totally different.
So many more people were like, why would I
want to do tech or whatever?
I want to do traditional print or advertising.
And then sometimes there's ways of doing social media.
That's a little bit of both, and you
can bring in that coding computer science side.
Yeah, and you know what's funny too is when I was at Stanford,
a lot of people also sometimes, they
would want to take graphic design or computer science
classes, but it was hard to find hands-on projects that really
married both of them together.
So I think when I see someone with your background,
it's really fun and encouraging because you
found so many cool fashion gigs through your network
and made all your skills apply.
When I finished my job at the consulting firm,
I was trying to get into a fashion firm,
doing what I was doing before.
But I was trying to start a formula to pivot.
And then I wanted to go back to school
and do something I really loved.
And then I wanted to move to New York
because my brother was here, and I saw it,
and I was like, wait, this is where I have to be.
And putting all those things together,
I ended up applying to Parsons.
And for me, the way that I got into the creative field
was actually like, OK, I have a very strong,
scientific business background.
Let me pair it with something extremely creative.
Parsons was only project-based, only producing, being
creative, which is really hard when someone is coming
from a completely different background.
And now I feel like I'm equipped with these two things.
And I'm honestly just working on the creative side.
And I think it's going to be fun at one point
to try and see how they put these two things together.
And I don't know.
I had ideas before.
Maybe coding websites could be a very cool thing.
I had a similar thought recently because I
went from doing a lot of theory, a lot of hard science,
or even social science at times, to then going
into graphic design or art direction.
It's essentially like a trade.
And I don't think a lot of people think about it
that way, but there's a process to it.
It's very much like project-based,
like deadline-oriented.
And I just thought that the people I went to school with
would oftentimes think about art as really free-flowing.
Realistically, when you're in the industry,
it cannot be like that.
You will not survive in a project-based environment.
But I'm also seeing now, so over the past few years,
a lot of fashion tech.
And I've seen a few folks trying to start fashion tech
companies.
And I also saw that you have this Fashion in Web3 project
on your website.
I want to hear your thoughts on Web3 and fashion,
and maybe a little bit more about this project as well.
Yeah, I feel like it goes in waves, right?
I feel like there was a surge in fashion tech
at Copernicus that this tool.
Now I don't even remember, but they tried to introduce this.
I don't even remember what it was.
It looked like an iPod.
I think that goes in surges in even fashion and Web3.
It was big a year and a half ago,
where fashion brands would create costumes for video games
on Web3.
Everybody was talking about blockchain,
and they would put their products on the blockchain
as a certificate of authenticity.
And all these things, and now it's died, right?
Nobody's really talking about it.
I don't know when that's going to happen,
if it's ever going to happen.
Fashion is such a creative outlet for people,
and you don't want it to be complicated.
People are really scared about technology,
and it takes so long to accept the new technology
for a whole community to accept these changes.
And fashion is such a pleasure, or it's such a,
oh, let me put on this, because this is the image that I
want to give to other people.
And you don't want to put too much thought in it.
And fashion and Web3, my project that I did was more like,
I want to see.
Because I thought maybe that's how I'm going to put these two
things together, like computer science and fashion.
Maybe that's the space I need to go to.
So I didn't know, and it was a very fun project.
When I had to present it, everybody was like,
question marks on their faces, because they're like,
what is Web3?
Oh, I see.
And was this in a fashion context?
Yeah, it was in my class.
I had to present it, and everybody was like,
what the hell?
That was exactly the point.
For me, it was like, I want to explain Web3 to fashion people
and how you can use a profession.
So literally, the first chapter, that's
like a 50 pages book right away.
It was like a huge project.
Nice work.
That's not an easy feat.
But it was so interesting, right?
When something is interesting, it's so easy.
It's just like the deeper.
And I think there's so many spaces where Web3
can be cool for fashion.
And I think Nike is doing that so much.
There's Nike Virtual Studios.
They're ever evolving to see what works, what resonates.
And they have this immense budget to do that.
And it's like the playground, and they're
testing so many things like, oh, let's see
how it works in video games.
Or let's see how we can build a community with a blockchain
app or have VIP products for our members that connect their wallets
to our app.
I think if there's someone that is going to maybe come out
with a nice solution or something that resonates
with the public, it's maybe going to be Nike.
But right now, I feel like nobody really cares.
I know.
It's so hard.
To your point, fashion is so fun.
And even for me lately in my art practice,
I'm just trying to find more joy.
Because I got really deep into Web3 as well
over the past few years.
And there is very little excitement these days, I think.
I just took on a commission with a DAO, which
is the first project I've done in two years.
That gives me a little bit of hope.
But it's just a creative project for Zine
to compile some of the work that their artists have been doing.
Yeah, so I'm like, OK, I love that.
But again, the budget is not huge for it.
There's a lot of these little underground things happening.
I don't know if it's exactly going
to be the groundbreaking innovation that a lot of people
have been saying.
Maybe it just takes several years.
And on a personal level, I just want to have a giggle sometimes.
Yeah, the overarching idea of Web3 is what I'm attracted to.
In terms of creatives, they're trying
to give back real ownership to what you put out there.
So in the Web3 environment, whatever I post,
it's going to have a timestamp.
So whatever I post, then it's going
to have that attached to it, my credentials.
And then nowadays, it's like when
you use Pinterest or Instagram, there's
so much that gets screen-shotted and reposted
without crediting the original owner.
That's what Web3 is trying to fix.
Because on Web3, that's not going to be possible, ideally.
Now, that I don't know if in practice it's already a thing.
But I think there are so many concepts of Web3
which are so good, especially for creatives,
and trying to give back the rights to creatives that are not
ever credited enough.
I feel like you never really know
who is behind a certain project.
So many times, I go on.
Especially online.
You can so easily rip a JPEG from Pinterest and post it.
But you don't have a chain of who made it.
Exactly.
And that's important.
And so many times, I go on websites.
And I'm like, oh, who made this website?
A lot of times, it's not even credited.
Or I look at a campaign.
I'm like, oh, who's the photographer?
Who's the model?
They're never tagged in any picture.
They're just the image.
They're part of it.
It's made of them.
Yeah.
It's like, literally, they're making this image.
And your brand, for you to not credit them, it's so weird.
So I think that we need more of that philosophy.
We're giving back the light to creatives
who's actually behind a certain project.
In your ideal world, what kind of projects
would you take on next?
And what would you contribute to them?
That's a very interesting question.
Because I feel like I've been so lucky to constantly have
projects that I never really sat down and asked myself
this question.
I think I'm trying to maybe do more art direction rather
than graphic design.
I feel like at some point, I want
to collaborate with other people.
Maybe my ideal next project would be actually
with someone else, because I find myself working alone
most of the time.
I do collaborate with founders, because most of my clients
are small entrepreneurs.
I present ideas, and they give me feedback.
And we go from there.
It's a very collaborative approach.
But I never really work with another creative.
Maybe I give a design, and they twitch,
and then they give it back to me.
Or someone that I do the art direction,
and they do the graphic design.
So I think my ideal next project is
find a way to have more of a team of creatives to work with
and see how that works.
I'd be down to collab if you ever want.
That's a great thing about meeting so many people
in this field, right?
I'm thinking about having a bit of a team around me
so that when I have a project, and you do illustration,
and I love your illustrations, you can't draw at all.
Some projects, I'm like, I wish I had an illustrator
to make an illustration that evokes this feeling.
Or I'm thinking of a logo that is hand-drawn.
For me, it's really hard to do it.
And I would commission it or work with someone else.
Yeah, that's probably the next thing I would want to do.
One of the things you mentioned is working alone.
I freelance, but I also am at an independent studio
a few days out of the week,
just because it's been such a nice switch up.
What do you do when you're working on projects?
Do you stay in the apartment?
Do you go to a co-working space?
What works for you?
I do a mix.
I usually do half day in my apartment and half day,
I can't do a whole day at home
because home is where I eat and sleep.
I don't want it to be my office that much.
Now I'm so used to working alone
that I'm maybe scared to have other people around me
that are going to distract me because I got so used to it.
But I feel like I currently don't know good co-working.
And none of my friends ever told me
about a good co-working space.
Everybody that I know that is working from home
is actually working from home.
I wish maybe Soho House was more of a real community
where you can actually connect with people.
I feel like I never really talked to anyone there.
I was going to ask you if you like it
because I hear mixed reviews about Soho House these days.
People are like, oh, it's so different.
Exactly, like for working, it's an amazing space.
It's beautiful inside and you have great Wi-Fi
and you can order food.
I concentrate so much when I go there
because I just sit with my computer and stay there hours.
I just wish maybe more like people were more open
and knowing other people.
I don't know how you can make that happen
so that people are more eager to actually talk to each other.
I also don't go a lot, like I never go to the events.
So maybe that's me getting so involved.
That was how Soho House was born, right?
It was like a place for creatives.
I don't think that's it anymore.
I think there's some independent co-working spaces
in New York.
I hear a lot about those in LA too.
I feel like we're also like in this weird period
where I think some people are still stuck in like 2020
work from homeland and then there are other people
who go out to events, but then it's maybe a third
of the people who used to.
So it's still not quite popping.
This is something I wanted to ask you.
How do you find working independently
versus working in an agency?
What are the differences?
What's it for you?
It's so nice to have freedom with what projects you take on
as an independent.
And there was a period during 2020
where I was freelancing with an agency, which is great
because it gave me a steady stream of projects,
my hourly rate.
Back then it was like 60 an hour as well.
But then I would also take on projects
that the agency just wouldn't give me
because I was working with a social media agency
that did like a lot of celebrity, Instagram content creation.
And I was like, oh, I wanna do some branding and like logos.
So I had to do that on my own
if I really wanted to go very deep into a brand book.
I think juggling both of that was challenging.
And so eventually left the agency and pursued my own work.
And this is the challenging part because during this time,
I also moved to Maui for three years.
So I was in Hawaii working independently.
At that time, one of my struggles was working on my own
is totally fine, but doing it from an island
in a not creative space.
New York is so different.
You can go out and find a ton of creatives
and get inspiration.
But for me, a lot of the people who'd be working from home
if I went to a coffee shop or like in the tech industry
or like 20 years older,
I ended up eventually coming back to the mainland
because it's actually just so many more people
my age group who are at this phase in their life.
And I felt like I needed more camaraderie around that.
But I think there are ways to get community
outside of working at an agency
because agencies are so fast paced.
And I don't know what the industry is right now
because I'm at an independent studio.
So it's like just the right amount of work for me
three days a week.
And I get to work on a lot of different projects too,
like branding or at the moment,
I'm also helping my boss set up a podcast
and a quarterly zine where we work with local artists
and then bring them in the studio and do a pop-up.
So it's a lot more interactive and I love that
because I'm a very social person.
I guess the other part I learned too
is that some of these soft skills
like talking to people, throwing events,
it's not a very common skill to have.
I just don't think I could do
work from home corporate environment again.
I've thought about it many times.
There's a trade-off where you get a certain amount
of stability and benefits, but then it's also,
it's not like that job is secure.
There's just so much more freedom
in choosing your own project.
It's harder for sure.
And also might be harder because of where I'm at right now.
I live in Boise, Idaho.
So I have to go out and seek projects.
It's not quite as easy as I think it would be in New York,
but that is one of my hurdles
and something that I like that trade-off.
I never really thought about the location of everything.
Maybe here in New York is easier
because a lot of my clients are word of mouth.
They go somewhere and I'm like,
oh yeah, I'm a graphic designer.
And they'll remember that either a friend of theirs
would connect me or they'll be like,
actually I have this project I'm working on
that you could help me with.
So yeah, I never really thought about the location
and maybe that changes the way you wanna work,
if you wanna work at an agency or you don't.
I think traveling for work is essential
if you're freelancing.
Because I've also had friends who would travel all the time
like New York to LA and sometimes going out to Colorado
for concert projects.
If you're just talking to people
and letting them know what you do, that also works.
Maybe I should plan a trip to New York at some point.
Like this type thing.
Yeah, I know I haven't been back in so long.
I've been in Boise, Idaho since July.
And I was in LA before that.
LA is also not the best right now.
A lot of people are struggling in the industry
but people are still doing well.
I have friends who have studio jobs.
The enthusiasm is a little bit low.
Here in New York, it's great.
A lot of people are going with the freelancing route
which is exciting.
There's a surge in being independent,
being your own publisher, being your own boss.
Like even Substack, it's such a call
for being completely independent.
You don't want to publish me,
I'll publish myself on Substack.
But it goes well.
I love that people just publish whatever they're thinking
about and make their own mini magazine.
That's great.
That's incredible.
And it's the same way of being a freelancer.
I think at some point I do want to work at an agency.
I want to have that experience.
I want to know what it feels like, what it looks like.
I want to learn from other people.
It gets you a lot of exposure to big clients very quickly.
I think agencies are previously a little bit too
demanding of people's time,
but I'm hoping that with the changes over the past two years
we'll be a little bit more realistic.
I heard stories from people pre 2020
who would work at an agency and make maybe like 40K salary
but they're going into work from like 8A.
And I'm like, in what world does that make sense?
Like monetarily?
It's still like that.
Yeah, okay.
Cause I'm like, I just don't think that makes sense really.
And I know that it's like good exposure at times,
but also it's like you have to prepare yourself for that.
Yeah.
I had an interview with this agency
and then I did a test for three days,
but I think it was fake.
I think they wanted my work for free for a week.
I'm not the only person to wish this happened
with the same agency.
It's this very elite, a fashion agency.
Everything aligns like plots of faking
that you're going to get in and use you for a week.
Because I was working on client projects.
There needs to be laws against that in my opinion.
Like, I have 30 laws against that.
But you have to sign an NGA
and like I was working on client projects
and of course they had big clients
and I fully produced for a week
and I was doing their hours.
So I was like working at night
and I didn't even have a contract in my hands
because I was hoping that at the end of this,
there would be a contract.
Just recently a friend of mine told me
that her friend happened the same with the same agency.
They had her working for a whole week
and she thought there was gonna be a contract at the end
and then there's not.
So I think there's definitely still some agencies
that are like that.
Definitely when I was applying that salaries
for people who are just starting
are super low in the creative field
and I think it's gonna be a good experience
if I do it at some point
and have the financial freedom to take a lower paying job
but get exposed to so many clients and new methods
and people who have been in the industry for so long.
I have friends who are like doing PhDs right now
and I think they make 40,000 for like research or something.
So I'm like, I don't think it's a horrible idea
if you can give it as an educational experience.
Exactly.
People take that sort of deal to go back to school.
So you get more portfolio projects.
Exactly, I see it like an educational thing,
like an internship.
Yeah, exactly.
Amazing.
What kind of projects are you working on now?
Can you tell me about them a little?
Yeah, I have one retainer client, which is Benchen
and I've been working with them there
that since I started freelancing, it's been a while
and it's always a different project.
It's so fun.
And that's what I love to be involved with in business
because I came in to do graphic design
but it's ever evolving.
And then she has a platform and community for women
and she teaches Kundalini.
She has like monthly memberships
for developing personal power, sensuality, vitality.
And she leads this like meditation every day.
It's a whole world and it's so beautiful.
I started practicing with her as well.
And it has helped me so much with my business
because she teaches those workshops.
I feel like when you are an entrepreneur,
it's also an internal journey.
You have to sell yourself.
You have to go through limiting beliefs and you have to,
or there's so many thoughts when you become
an entrepreneur that you have to go through
and like hear those steps that you have to get over.
And I think that solid meditation practice,
so like with her, I was able to like,
think go through them way, it was way easier.
But yeah, I'm working with her a lot, which I love
because it's a blend of what I like
and doing my work at the same time.
And I also got a new client,
which is in the acupuncture industry.
So I'm working with them.
They're starting out, they're building a brand.
Right now I'm working on their brand book
and gathering a bit of images.
I drew a new logo for them.
We're still the beginning.
I find the palette for the brand,
they didn't really have much.
And that's what I love is I keep attracting businesses
in fields that I'm really interested in.
It's so easy because I can resonate
with what they're trying to communicate.
Acupuncture is something that I do in this city
and that has helped me so much.
Their goal is to make acupuncture
part of everyone's health care, especially women,
because there's so much about hormones
that you can cure with acupuncture.
It helped me so much.
And it's so cool when I build a brand for them
that it's very cool and that attracts people
so that people start getting to know acupuncture
and start maybe integrating it.
They work with insurance companies
so that you can be covered.
It's such a beautiful project.
And for me, I love working on these kinds of things.
And so I'm really excited about this project
and where it's gonna go.
I love these projects with women's health care
and wellness in mind.
There's actually a ton of those I see lately
and that's fun for me, it's healing.
I just figured out the other day,
I was gathering my thoughts and I was like,
I've worked only with female-funded businesses
or queer clients.
It's beautiful, right?
Because I was about to get this client,
which was four male founders, and I had this meeting
and it felt so wrong.
I was like, I don't think I wanna get into this space.
And I was like, I'm just gonna say no.
And I think it was the first time I was saying no.
It was hard as a freelancer to be like,
I'm gonna reject the project.
But at the same time, I was having the first calls
with the acupuncture girls and I was like, you know what?
I'm gonna go with what feels best
because I don't wanna, I don't know.
It's hard to say no sometimes to projects,
but it took me a really long time to learn this.
Sometimes it saves you actually.
Something feels off energetically.
I don't know what it is, but there have been times
where I said yes to projects just for the money
and it ends up being a huge burden later on.
And I'm like, why would I say yes to this?
And then it's actually harder to get out later.
Yeah, totally.
I feel like that's something that Luigi taught me
because he was doing a lot of client-facing roles
and she was like, you need to fire bad clients.
Sometimes you just have to get rid of them
because it takes too much effort and too much of your time
to keep them on.
And so at that point, you're better off creating space
for something better.
Oh yeah, better stuff will come into it.
It starts costing you basically.
That's a good reminder.
Yeah, because I get to these points sometimes where I'm like,
I think I wanna make space for something else.
I might be at that point
with some of the projects in my life.
What are you working on right now?
Right now, I have this independent zine project
with the DAO I mentioned.
It's all online right now.
So what they want is to bring the experience
into a print format.
So I'm gonna design the zine for them.
And that is going to probably like a two month project.
What else am I working on?
So then I'm also at the independent studio.
I've been doing a lot of zine projects lately,
which is interesting.
And I used to make a lot of zines in 2016 just for fun.
So I am personally trying to build out my work,
specifically working with podcasters, writers,
other artists.
And when you mentioned making websites
for other artists and creatives earlier,
that's something I felt really passionate about
because I've met a few artists recently
who they're so good at their practice,
whether that's watercolor or sculpture,
but they don't wanna spend their time working
on their website or e-commerce site.
So I think that's something I'm gonna try to build out more
and see if I can at least get a few people on retainer
and help them with their distribution.
So that's something I'm planning out.
And then other than that,
there's a few things I do non-design related.
I teach luxury, some really into the fitness space.
Yeah, and I've been loving the gym scene out here too,
because I meet so many women
who are like running their own businesses
or involved in real estate, or they just need design.
And I think that's been a great way for me to slow down
because for a while I was saying yes,
like all sorts of projects.
I worked at an AI startup for a little bit.
And I think I just got so removed from my creative process
and why I like designing in the first place,
doing things like my podcasts
and taking on small projects with other creatives,
working at the studio a few days a week,
it's perfect for me.
Yeah, and then come the new year,
we'll see what else is out there.
If something interesting will spark my attention.
I was so surprised to see how many people
actually need design services,
especially if they're starting out,
they can't just call up an agency
because agencies are so expensive.
They are.
I think for a small agency,
you have to put down at least five to 8,000,
but for the website, it's probably gonna cost you 10,000.
I never knew.
And then when I started working,
I realized that I had an audience for me
and for what I was doing.
It's like a completely different process.
I think the benefit to work with a freelancer
and how I saw myself is that
you have this very close approach and I'm always there.
You can call me up and we are meeting up in person
and it's so collaborative.
We can have feedback sessions.
And it's something that I feel like with an agency,
you're not really able to do as well.
So there's like a benefit in pricing
and owning more where the project is going, right?
Which of course is not gonna take out of my creativity
and I feel like I'm always aligned with the clients' wants.
But it's that closeness that allows me to get very clear
about their vision and bring it to life
exactly how they saw it.
Not exactly, but very close to what they saw it.
You have an intuition for that.
And it sounds like you take on clients
who you're pretty aligned with.
And I feel like maybe you can get that with an agency.
I feel like with an agency,
I've talked to some friends who were,
unfortunately, you do just have to do it sometimes.
It's like, I don't necessarily agree
with the creative direction
or what the client's asking for.
But if it's in your contract to do another revision,
then you have to do it.
Do you run up against that or have you?
Going in a bit of a different direction.
Unnecessary revisions.
Because I've been seeing that a lot in the studio context
where clients don't know how to manage their own feedback.
Sometimes I will ask everyone on their team.
That was such a learning lesson for me.
You need to provide the structure
because the clients are all over the place.
So that was learning the hard way for me.
Now what I do is that I'm like,
there's gonna be two review rounds.
There's the first one, which is,
then it depends, of course,
what type of assets I'm giving them.
But the first one is first draft,
get a review, go over it.
There's probably a solid amount of changes
or they maybe wanna go to a slightly different direction
or something.
And then the second round, for me, the project is finished,
but maybe there's a little twitch
of something that needs to be fixed.
So I give the second review round,
is everything okay, done?
Or, okay, maybe there's a missing piece.
So that's my structure.
When I'm working with a fashion brand right now,
when it's a small business,
they're more likely to accept what you do
and wanna be guided by you
in the creative direction of the project.
They trust you with your eye and your taste.
That's why they hire you in the first place.
And then working with a bigger firm,
like a fashion brand, there's a creative director,
there's a marketing officer,
an art director, there's the founder.
And I never get to talk to the higher levels.
I have my meetings with the marketing producer
and the chief marketing officer.
Whatever I produce goes to the founder
and the creative director.
There has been time where they're doing a brand refresh.
I did like a new brand book for them.
And I suggested for them to go into a more modern,
one font, a little bit bolder.
Instead of the classic serif font, like then,
I was like, let's do something cool and different,
which was not gonna be so different.
But yes, we did this whole brand book
and chief marketing officer was like,
wait, I actually like this.
This is very cool.
Let's go with it.
A new chapter, let's go.
And then the brand book went,
and this was like a month we were working on this.
Then the brand book, like second review,
brand book goes to the creative director
and they're like, oh no, we don't like it.
We went back to not square zero,
like not where they were before,
but it was like an in-between of what I suggested
and what they were before.
So that happens.
And I'm like, yeah, I think the other idea was way cooler.
You are the client, this is your brand.
And I think I'm more here to do all the graphic design
that they don't have the time to do.
So sometimes you have to like let go, I think.
And I'm so happy to work with them
and I'm having such a fun time.
And I think I'm just there to support with graphic design
because they don't have someone in house that can do that
and they wanna work with someone that gets it.
So now I'm doing their Instagram templates,
which every time I suggest something more creative
than this industry standard,
they're like, oh my God, what's that?
And I'm like, okay, easy.
Then they just want someone that knows a grid system
and can put an image and text the right size.
And that's great, even easier.
I think it's nice to not have an ego with feedback,
but I do have to say lately,
I've noticed this trend of people really playing it safe
with branding.
And I think that might be an economic indicator.
So many people just wanna play it safe these days.
The amount of clients who are like,
oh, I just want navy blue
and something that looks really simple.
That's okay, we hired a branding agency regardless.
They'll just give it to you.
It's like their loss, right?
I feel like there's so many brands
that are setting the standard
and then other brands want to be like that.
I always ask my clients,
what is your aspirational competitor?
And what is your aspirational aesthetic?
What is the best aesthetic to you that you'd like?
And there's some brands
that they get mentioned to me all the time.
I'm like, I love how this brand does their social media.
Boom, and I'm like, which is open, the meditation app.
They have a very cool Instagram, I agree.
And everybody's like, I want an Instagram like theirs.
And it's incredible because they are setting the standard
and everybody's trying to do that.
So I'm starting to think about that.
How do I make sure that it works
like the standard that I'm making you need?
That's what I'm working on
because a lot of people are asking me
for social media templates.
So how did, because now,
and everybody now is like used of having this kind of format
of infographic templates and branded stories
with all your fonts and colors.
So how can I make sure that I'm doing that?
Something that resonates
with the current Instagram audience, right?
They just want direct information, clear information,
but also make it not like everybody else.
And I still don't have an answer for that.
I hope I'm gonna figure it out.
But yeah, there's clear trends
and I don't know the answer yet to how to work with that.
There are times, like seasons in my life
when I'm more tolerant to it
and others where I'm like, I just don't wanna do that.
I'm probably in one of those seasons right now.
But yeah, I think it's nice to just let it go.
And I think what I've learned too
is these are your clients' projects
and then what they pay you, you see it up for your own
and then you do something fun and cool
and then you show them how it's done.
And that's okay if they're two separate things.
I think my goal as a creator is to get to a point
where I get hired to do exactly what I do.
I imagine one of the designers that I really love
is David Carson and he gets hired for exactly what he does.
And that's the coolest thing.
Let me look at his work.
He's known because he worked a lot with Surf magazines
and he didn't have a design background
and he started doing graphic design
and he just like consistently broke any possible rules
that was there and he works a lot with collage
and defined the aesthetic of surfing
and board culture in general, whatever it is,
skateboarding, snowboarding.
So anti-grid, but I love it.
It's like very loud and it works.
Yeah, and people hire him.
Now he's been doing this for I don't know how many years.
But now he gets hired to do that.
They're like, oh, I want, he's more of an artist
at this point, you're like commissioning him
to do a piece for them, but signed David Carson
and with his signature style.
For me, that's like my ultimate goal, right?
Someone is hiring you to do exactly what you do.
Exactly, I so relate to that.
And I've been talking to my artist friends too.
You have to build an audience for your work sometimes
and do it enough to where people are like,
that's exactly what I want.
But it takes time.
And for some people it's faster than others.
So I think building out space to be authentic,
even if you're doing client projects is so important.
Yeah, for me, that's a big value, right?
It's like being true to what you're doing
and what your values are.
And it's like that's in general for my own life
and how I wanna present myself.
The creative environment is such a self exploration.
It's not easy, it's so spiritual
and you have to keep finding a way to get back out there
and ride the waves.
It's not always just good.
Sometimes you're getting pummeled,
you're like, okay, crap, how do I get back up?
Beautiful.
All right, we have a few minutes left.
Is there anything else you wanna discuss today?
I've enjoyed talking to you.
I have just one question for you that I'm so curious.
How come did you move to Maui?
What's interesting is I was working remote at the time
with a social media agency, so I could travel.
I had a friend in college who I did a podcast episode with.
Her name is Jane, that's not her actual name,
but we were roommates and we lived at this co-op together
at Stanford called Synergy.
She was really involved in the co-op scene in the Bay Area
and then she had this friend named Ton who is a DJ.
She met at another co-op.
Ton set up this house in Maui where she would DJ
and we would throw parties.
And that was really fun.
It was actually this house where it was me,
this other artist named Eva,
served to and did a lot of these really gestural,
massive paintings on plywood.
Then there was another woman there named Jazz
who would do these really cool drone ocean photographs.
That was how it was for a few months.
Then I met a boyfriend out there
and I was staying for almost three years.
I basically stayed there up until the fires happened
and the culture changed a lot.
But it's still an amazing place.
I still have friends there.
And my friend Ton who first started the house,
she's now in Ibiza, so she's really DJing now.
She used to be in the tech scene in San Francisco.
She's someone who really pursues her dreams too.
After everything happened, the scene really changed in Maui.
She's in Spain, so.
That's so cool.
Yeah, it is.
And I feel like that's how the past few years have been.
It's okay if COVID's gonna happen.
Like you have to find ways to push your joy through an outlet.
And so one of my outlets for joy was Maui.
And I was like, it was great.
Yeah, you just go with it.
No, I love that.
I think Hawaii is one of the most beautiful places ever.
And I love that you lived there for so long.
It's gorgeous.
I met a lot of pro surfers.
If you ever go, it's a cool place to meet people.
A lot of travelers too.
I would love to stay in touch with you
and thank you so much for joining me today
with such a good conversation.
I love sharing with you.
And so we've been through so many of the same things
that it's so nice to see that ideas
and see what other creatives think.
Such a wonderful conversation.
And it's all very real.
All right, folks, that was our episode today.
Again, I mentioned I will be traveling to New York
at the end of March into early April.
If you are friends who would like to hang out
in New York during that time, please let me know.
This trip is going to be pretty impromptu,
but the goal is to freelance and network
and find folks who want to work on design.
I am pivoting more into my own work
and it's been kind of surprising to me
that it's actually been over 10 years
since I've been doing graphic design, but it has been.
And now is the perfect moment to just take full ownership
of what I like to do and go hard on it.
There is really no perfect moment for it.
And I think that's something I've had a hard time
adjusting to the fact that, you know,
maybe there is like a good place to network
and to find people to work with,
but there's never really a great time to start.
The best moment is always now prioritizing your dreams,
your vision, and what feels right is always something
that we have control over, even if we're working
with other people in an agency space or on our own.
So this is just one of the ways that I'm trying
to make it work at the moment.
Again, you can follow my Stub Stack
where I'm starting to write more personal posts online
at Jules Pools.
And you can always follow me on Instagram
for more day-to-day updates at Jules.Pools.
All right.
Thanks for listening and love ya.
Talk to you next time.