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As you may have already heard, this summer’s been the start of something exciting here at Together. We’ve been working on the launch of our first-ever internship programme, giving shiny new graduates a generous helping of real-life agency experience – and bringing fresh talent into our studio.
Our Creative Studio Manager Liz Stocker, Art Director James Warfield, and Managing Director Ben Fathers got together to design a targeted, managed, modular programme featuring a mix of live and project briefs. With content spanning brand design, packaging, copywriting, creative ideation, digital design and art direction, the internship gives graduates paid, hands-on experience in a whole range of agency disciplines.
With the programme designed, our internship team got out of the studio to find brilliant new graduates in their natural habitat. Liz and James went to graphic design degree shows at Nottingham Trent University and the University of Lincoln, as well as reaching out to course leaders and employability teams in the hunt for the brightest new talent.
It’s an approach that really paid off. We were blown away by the level of interest we saw, and the quality of work that was submitted. We invited people to share their portfolios and come in for interview, before picking three outstanding candidates to be our very first interns.
Today we’re delighted to introduce you to our second intern, Benson Kuok. Over the past month, Benson has impressed us with his out of the box thinking, fantastic attention to detail and his new found love for user experience design.
I studied Graphic Design at Nottingham Trent University, which encouraged me to think creatively, gaining professional and technical skills that reflect current and future industry practice. During my time at NTU, I have explored various aspects of visual communication - I specialised in typography, branding, packaging and print artefacts.
My dissertation focused on Japanese aesthetics and their interpretation of Emptiness - a study of Japanese Design. For years, I had been fascinated with its rational and functional design approach and visual communication style.
Having a huddle meeting every morning with the Together team, followed by project briefings, team meetings, discussions or catch-ups, depending on the schedule. Then I carry on with the design tasks, with just a shout to the team with any problems or questions; sometimes I’m just curious about things. Also, I usually like to make myself a cappuccino with Oat milk alongside my work in the office!
My day started at around 7:30. I had a simple breakfast, a Croissant, then went for my 10mins morning walk across the city centre to the studio.
The Together team is bold, efficient and professional. In particular, I have worked with the creative directors, Anil and Gemma, on developing art direction and UX design. Both of them are fantastic mentors, creatives and friends. It’s an amazing opportunity to learn from them. Anil’s passion for type, branding and art direction has pushed me to think boldly and to produce the best creative solution for the client. I really enjoy having chats about type and design with Anil; he has always been attentive to detail and has a good eye for typography. Gemma’s design thinking, approach and deliverables are professional and high-quality. She has taught me the knowledge, problem-solving skills and creative mindset of UX design, where I found a new area of interest - and helped me to dig deeper into this immense digital design world.
To be honest, I don’t think about the future much. I love to design, work on innovative solutions and make a difference with my work. As a recent graduate, I’m looking for any opportunity and to work on different creative engagements to expand my industry knowledge and professional and technical expertise. In terms of my career outlook, in the short term, which is in the next one or two years, I hope to be recognised as a multidisciplinary designer working with like-minded creatives at a design studio!
Embracing bad ideas to get to good ideas and “Never Stop Learning”, aka one of Together’s values.
Discovering a new interest in UX design has been the highlight of my week, or of my internship experience - as well as a chance to push boundaries and incorporate my strengths in typography and print into a digital space.
Definitely, ten out of ten. Excellence experience working alongside the Together team in a vibrant studio environment.
The Together internship has been a really positive, exciting experience for all of us and we’re hoping to make it an annual programme. Follow us on social to be the first to find out about our next round of internships and future opportunities.
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