A Designers Beginning

Holly Foster

by Holly Foster

Story

I have always been creative, it runs through my whole family in a number of different ways. My passion draws into being a freelance branding graphic designer.

I didn’t start out wanting to go into design. I did Maths, English and Religious Studies in Sixth Form. I’m a huge creative writer, I have been since I was thirteen. However, Sixth Form wasn’t for me and I left after AS Levels. I achieved my degree in Graphic Design in an unconventional way; going to college first and then attending a top-up year at university.

Funily enough, I left college loving graphics, and left uni hating it. As it turned out, I simply hadn’t explored enough areas of graphic design to find the one which suited me best. I fell into a career of being a creative assistant and admin assistant for a fellow creative friend who made play tents for sleepover companies. My first project was to fully design her Risk Assessment Guide, a 32 page brochure she sold to her customers. It’s a huge success and so far has sold almost 300 copies. My main job had me talking to customers, suppliers, understanding how to start and run a small business and providing brilliant customer service. I found that the customers were mainly new start-up businesses. They needed logos, business cards etc. I was able to offer branding services for these new sleepover companies and I quickly found my passion for design all over again.

After I lost my job due to the pandemic, I wanted to take my design skills more seriously; to really put my degree to good use and see how many businesses I could help creatively and connect further with their own audiences through consistent uniform branding. I launched my business, HF Designs, at the beginning of February. Slowly but surly, it is continuing to grow and I am gaining more confidence each day, and feeling really proud of myself. HF Designs turns four months old in June and I am really looking forward to growing and seeing how well I can do as a small business owner.

The start of my story as a small business owner and freelance branding graphic designer is short, but I believe the journey to be a lot longer and I look forward to thinking about how far I have come in a few years’ time. When you have a passion for something that you’re good at, there is no point putting it off. Give it a go and it might flourish into something amazing.

© Holly Foster 2021-05-27

Hashtags