AIGA Charlotte

Apr 17

Domtar & AIGA Charlotte: Part Deux

We at AIGA Charlotte couldn’t be happier to announce that Domtar has agreed to come on as a Chapter partner for another year. Their contribution enables us to continue to provide inspiring events for the AIGA Charlotte community. We’ve asked Ashley Maydak, Domtar’s Sustainable Business & Brand Management Graphic Designer & Web Specialist, to fill us in on what they are up to as a company and to talk a little about what the partnership means to them.

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What’s New
Domtar is North America’s largest marketer of uncoated printing paper and a leader in environmentally responsible practices. We’re committed to the responsible use of paper, but we’re also committed to communicating paper’s place and value to the businesses and people that use our products everyday. Of all those people, we consider designers to be one of the most important. We understand that designers do more than just make pretty things. Designers play a huge role in communicating important messages to the world and we’re proud to have our products in the equation. Our year as an AIGA Charlotte Chapter Partner has given us a front row seat to this innovative group of individuals and allowed us to better understand the unique struggles and joys faced by this group.

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Recently, we’ve launched our Cougar Paper Community, a gathering space for dreamers and doers. On a regular basis for many years, we’ve received incredible printed pieces from designers and printers from all over the United States and Canada. Recently, we decided to give these pieces a home online so we could share them with the world. Even though the site is brand new we’ve already received a large number of incredible submissions and we’d love to receive some from the Charlotte design community.

Our Partnership
Being partners with AIGA Charlotte encouraged us to get more involved with the organization as a whole. Last October, we were honored to be the paper sponsor for the GAIN: AIGA Design for Social Value conference in San Francisco, CA. Helping AIGA to promote design and the life-changing impact it can have all over the world was a wonderful experience.

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We’re also incredibly excited to facilitate AIGA Charlotte’s relationship with one of the city’s local agencies, Eric Mower and Associates. In early June, Domtar will sponsor a Meet Your Neighbor event held at the EMA offices lead featuring Partner/Creative Director Patrick Short. (Keep an eye out on aigacharlotte.org/events in the next couple weeks.) Patrick is part of the ultra-creative team responsible for the development of Domtar’s PAPERbecause campaign. In addition to generating meaningful ads for us, they’re also always on the lookout for innovative ways to promote the campaign (most recently at SXSW with the Paper Hotspot.)

We couldn’t be more thrilled with their work.

Domtar is incredibly excited about what year two of our AIGA Charlotte chapter partnership holds. This group works tirelessly to make sure their events are engaging, useful and inspirational. So if you haven’t joined the organization, please consider doing so. I look forward to seeing you at the next event!

Apr 01

AIGA Charlotte Member Spotlight: Andrew Lichtenhan

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Andrew Lichtenhan is a Graphics Coordinator and Technical Writer at Wix Filters. An AIGA member since 2012, he also takes on freelance work via Tall Oaks Design.

What would people be surprised to know about you?
I dislike the use of a Mac for my design and computing devices. I build my own PC Desktops, use an Android phone, and my tablet of choice (should I ever own one) would be a Nexus 7 or 10. It’s not that I dislike Apple products, but they do not for the money make technical sense for my experience, skills, preferences, and uses. I also do not use a Wacom tablet at all. My justification: play Counterstrike for a good number of years and see just how accurate and controlling you become with a mouse. While on that note, I loathe the Magic Mouse. I have to have real buttons.

What profession other than your own would you like to attempt?
I would say either film-making or video game design. I have a lengthy background in music (both writing and playing many instruments), photography, art, writing, technology, and storytelling. Those two fields I see many of my skills coming together for large collective projects. Those two media outlets also are the largest sector of entertainment now in our culture. I am amazed how much they borrow from and bridge one another.

What’s one goal (professional or personal) you have for the future?
I feel a position such as an art or creative director would be fantastic. I always felt that my very expansive and diverse learning habits, along with my multi-levels of creativity along many fields, are in ways cultivating me into such roles. I feel in many situations in working on teams (when I have the privilege) that I had a gift of bringing out the best of ambition and skill in my teammates. Outside of work for my personal life, I would love to have the woodworking and carpenter skills that my father and great-grandfather have shown. Time will tell for all, but many dreams exist far and in between.

What’s the best advice you’ve ever received?
When you critique, never use the words “like” or “love.” When I was in school I had some great faculty personally instruct this concept. Their point was that when you use such wording or thought processes you are letting a personal bias cloud your viewing and critiquing of the work. This goes not just for design, but artwork and contextual creativity as a whole among many other fields. I realize that I will always have some bias, but that instructed concept helps me step back further than I might not have before and see a work’s effectiveness—even if my personal dislikes are prevalent. When applied to my design, and tastes beyond that for that matter, that piece of advice helps me pinpoint a more effective viewing and appreciation for what a work stands for in and of itself.

What sound or noise do you love?
I have a few that always come to heart and mind. A loud rain or storm echoing through a chambered room; the ocean roar and blowing breeze; those are a few that might sound a bit more cliché. More to my own tastes I’d say I love the rumbling idle-purr and redline roaring of a classic American muscle V8. On a sillier note, the landing noise of a Type 40 Tardis whose pilot leaves the brakes on makes me smile every time.
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About AIGA Charlotte’s Member Spotlight

Each month AIGA Charlotte interviews a selected AIGA Charlotte Member. It is a great opportunity for the Charlotte design community to see who AIGA Charlotte is along with all the amazing things our members are doing. If you or someone you know would like to be interviewed and appear on AIGA Charlotte’s Member Spotlight, please contact Patrick Saleeby, Membership Director.

Mar 29

Mentor Matchup :: Design Study

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We asked mentor, Mark Iafrate, and mentee, Megan Dobrusin, to share with us their experience with the Mentor Matchup thus far. Here is what they are working on…

Their meetings so far
Meeting #1 @ Caribou Coffee
Mark: We got together for our first official meeting and reviewed each other’s portfolios. We talked about individual pieces and what made some great and others no-so-great. We determined that apart from technical and aesthetic aspects, our favorite work was done when we had an emotional connection to it, when we took longer to work on it with multiple iterations and when we focused on the little details. We also chatted about the process that goes into good design and briefly discussed freelance work and the importance of presenting yourself just as well as you present your work. We also setup the rules for our game of “Volleyball Design.” We will volley a poster design back and forth each week and iterate on it throughout the MentorMatchup program (see sample below).

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Meeting #2 @ Amelie’s French Bakery 
Megan: We met at Amelie’s for coffee and this meeting was much more informal than the last. Generally, we talked about what had been going on the past week. I was working on some freelance projects and was talking to people at FIG marketing, and Mark gave me some details on how his interview went for a freelance project. We also talked about our love for letterpress and screen printing and other design topics for the rest of the time. Even though we didn’t have a set structure for the meeting, it was still a good way to catch up and learn about new topics.

Meeting #3 Carolina Ale House
Mark: For our third meeting we decided on a specific topic of discussion: freelance. Megan came up with a few great questions and we went through them together. Topics included how to get your portfolio noticed, good networks or groups to be part of, ways to improve your work in your downtime, pricing projects and coming up with hourly rates and how to handle different types of clients. I think it was one of the most productive and information-filled meetings we’ve had so far, and it helped a lot too because it got me talking about topics I hadn’t thought about for a while.

Meeting #4 @ Paper Skyscraper
Megan: We met at Paper Skyscraper on East Blvd and perused the aisles of books and funky items in the store. We talked about current fads, like how mustaches are everywhere, and classic designs that are here to stay. We went through some of the books and talked about how cool they were and the good ideas people had put into production. It was nice to be able to talk about each cool item we found from one designer to another. We learned a lot about the other’s interests and design style by what we appreciated in the store.

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Mark and Megan will give us an update in a couple months to let us know how their mentorship partnership completed. Stay tuned…