Sometime, a month or so ago, I was approached by my agent about designing new associate uniforms for a national retail chain. He had, in fact, included some of my sketches in the initial proposal that he sent to their corporate office. They liked the designs that I had created and began negotiating with my agent, trying to pull the design work into a packaged deal. Long story made short: They were unable to come to terms and that deal has gone belly up. This happens sometimes and I wasn't seriously counting on the gig - especially since it is way outside of my norm - that there really is no harm and no foul.

One lesson that I should have learned by now is to ask my agent who the client is BEFORE I say that I will consider the gig. My work is edgey and often outside of anything anyone would consider to be along "corporate lines" so it's Double-Dutch funny when I am presented with a proposal for a project that needs to hold to strict corporate guidelines. Be that as it may, I agreed to take on some new design work for a corporate client whose business is based in education and tutoring. Word is that they want to have some new designs that their students will want to wear, thus extending their marketing reach. They want to be seen as cool - like it's cool to be one of their students.

Some of the issues that I've encountered in comping the intial designs are market related. Their students are mostly tweens. I design mostly for the juniors and misses markets. They have not yet provided me a breakdown on the percentage of boys vs girls that attend their classes and have been hedging off on sending samples of their current designs.

Through some rather light research my agent was able to find out who was doing their current design & production projects and he sent me a link to the company's website. Most of their designs are very generic and not that snappy. In fact they're rather bland and boring and look very much like they were created with clipart. So here I am, preparing some light comps and a few design ideas that run totally against their current grain.

1 Flats, Illustrations and Designs © Haze McElhenny 2008Edu-Program Sketches: 1 Flats, Illustrations and Designs © Haze McElhenny 2008

My agent is looking for designs that are a little bit fun, a tiny bit edgey, and not so much the run of the mill. Still, they will need to fit with the company's current image that will remain unchanged. [Insert a big healthy, but exasperated *sigh*] and then wonder why I did not ask all of the pertinent questions out front.

Live and learn -- yes. I obviously need to do more of the latter. What do you guys think? Am I somewhere close to the mark or should I go back to the drawing board by way of the circular file?

Again: These designs are for the tween market and must be acceptable to the parents as much as they must be seen as somewhat cool by the students.

Love This Email Print Facebook Stumble It! Report