Assisting Designer Kyle Bean

I have been lucky enough to assist one of my favourite Designers this week, Kyle Bean. Kyle is represented by Blink Art, and has produced some incredibly clever and extremely well realised projects for a lot of big clients like Hermés, Libertys, and Selfridges. See his work here: http://www.kylebean.co.uk

I got in contact with Kyle a few weeks ago, showed him some of my work, and he very kindly allowed me to assist him in his latest project; an installation for top fashion designer Matthew Williamson’s shop window in Central London.

The Brief that Matthew Williamson himself had set, was for a design that could be appropriate all year round, but could also be changed and adjusted throughout the year, in line with his collections. Kyle proposed the idea of a wooden, hand-built tree, decorated with various materials, which would change ‘seasonally’ every few months.

This season (the first one) saw the tree decorated with coloured easter eggs, resembling buds on a tree. I helped Kyle in the Blink studios in Soho, to prime, sand and spray paint polystyrene eggs, and transport them to the Matthew Williamson store. I also photographed and filmed the process for Kyle.

It was a really great experience for me to be able to spend time and chat with someone who I completely aspire to. Kyle gave me a lot of great advice, and an insight into how he got to where he is now. I also helped him brainstorm for his next project, a magazine cover, which was fun.

He has asked me to assist him with this project all year round, so I look forward to next time!

Photos of the installation to come soon.

                                              Kyle Bean for CUT Magazine: 'Soft Guerilla' series.

 

Work Experience- Pretzel Films

I've recently spent a week working at Pretzel films, a Production company in London, with a number of talented Directors, who make everything from short films and adverts to music videos.

I was an in-house runner for a week, and my duties included everything from general office work, to helping the Directors with specific projects and tasks.

The main thing I gained from this work experience, was knowledge and experience of working in-house for a Production company. I've done a lot of on-set running, but to actually see day-to-day life within a Production company, and how that works, was really interesting, and gave me more of an idea of what it would be like to work full-time in Production.

Another highlight was actually being able to chat to the Directors and Producers. Often when running on a shoot, because it can get a bit manic, you don't get to talk to people as much. But I got some great advice, particularly from the younger Directors, who had only a few years ago been in a similar position to the one I'm in now.

Sometimes it can be a bit intimidating to go up and chat to more senior members and Directors, but everyone went out of their way to chat to me which was really nice.

All in all, it was a really beneficial experience- Pretzel has a great group of people working there. Have a look at their work here: http://pretzelfilms.com/#home

Here's one of my favourite films from Pretzel, Directed by Jamie Maule-Ffinch, who was really kind to me and gave me a lot of valuable career advice: