So... where I have I been for four years?!
Well, when last we talked, I had been working for a few months at a theatre in DC. I served as the communications manager and publicist. And it was fantastic and challenging work, a very cool job at a well-regarded institution. I was doing really well, too. Leaving my previous job had me questioning my skills and abilities, and it took some time to adjust, but I proved a lot to myself in this new job.
However, on the side I was still designing costumes for area theatres and universities. And I loved that, too. At that point I had gone about as far as I could go as a designer while still holding a day job--particularly with a long commute to D.C. from Baltimore. So if I wanted to continue to grow as a designer, I had to decide to make a leap of faith. And after 15 years in communications, I did.
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| Queenie for The Wild Party, my thesis project, 2016 |
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| Uncle Vanya rendring, 2015 |
My weakest point as a designer was visually presenting my ideas. I very rarely had to do renderings for jobs, and I wasn't out shopping new companies often, so didn't build an art portfolio. And I needed to build connections. Option A. was to quit my job, take a loan, register for art classes, and just network and pound the pavement. Option B. was grad school, knowing I had a lot of skills, but that I could learn a lot more from a faculty made up of actively working designers with many years in the field. And University of Maryland has a fine arts-trained costume designer as head of costumes, who is an active designer regionally, nationally, and internationally. So grad school it was.
Recently, when going through my old portfolios and show binders, I took a quick shot of one of the renderings I did about six or eight months before I went back to school. I hate showing these old renderings because they are really rough and immature in skill level. However, to show them against a set I did this year, a year out of school, I can see how far I've come!
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| Midsummer, 2018 |
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| Renderings for A Midsummer Night's Dream, 2018 |
I have a lot more to say about the grad school experience, especially as an older student with professional design work already under my belt, but that's for another day. Today I am out in the world, with greatly improved artistic skills, and broader professional connections and experience than I had before I made this choice. I've been freelancing for over a year now. It's hard, and the dry times make me anxious about this leap sometimes, but for this year I have continually worked as a designer or design assistant, teacher/advisor, or in some other costume-adjacent job, so that's huge. The future is scary, but exciting!
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