Adaptation

I started this term as being completely uncertain about my future. Several questions were starting to pop into my head and I couldn’t find any answers to them. 
Am I gonna find an internship ? Will I be able to come back to London ? Will my internship be remote or onsite ? How am I gonna be able to share and learn from others if I am stuck at home in my home country ? I am ready to face reality in London on my own again ? 

After a lot of thinking, evaluating the pros and cons, I took a train to London and started to actively look for an internship. I was ready to face rejection, to struggle, to be criticised and to be patient enough to find a job.
​However, what I wasn't ready for was facing rejection mostly because of covid. Couldn’t help thinking that I could've had a change to go further with some of my applications in a normal world. From those rejections I thought it was time for me to adapt myself to the current situation. What if studios couldn't hire me at all because of the pandemic ? What if finding an internship became impossible ? I couldn't just stay there waiting and hoping for something so uncertain. 
​
So, I decided to work on something concrete, something that just depends on me and on my motivation. Something that doesn't respond to an email by “we are sorry but due to the pandemic we aren't looking for any interns anymore”. 
This is how my ambition of building my own online printing shop became more concrete.
Printing means doing something physical and bringing to life something that was originally designed as a digital outcome. And this what I love the most about being a graphic designer.
I was happily surprised to realise that LCC proposed a brief that was perfectly related to my personal project. The “Not Just a Shop” live brief is a project about selling creations in the shop run by the university. What I want to create for myself and for the shop will be a lot of different things that all make sense and go well together.  I would like to work on different themes based on what inspires me as a graphic designer and about what I believe in. 

The other solution I found to adapt myself and to make the most of my dps year is to experiment with freelance. I think it is a good way to improve my skills and to learn to adapt to the customers and to different styles.
​
After all of these ideas that could help me planning my future a bit more, I finally found an internship. I am learning the art of adaptation through it as well as I am working remotely. 
I am in charge of the social media’s visual communication, some graphic and design work including illustration and moving images. 

Working from home is quite challenging. I would say working remotely has pros and cons. One good thing about it is that it forces me to stay very organised. I don't have to follow any precise schedule or to be at work from 10h30 to 18h, but I have to get my tasks done by the end of each day. The negative thing about staying at home is that it could make me quite depressed. I am living in a very small room in halls and I don't think it is the best environment for me to stay focused 7 hours a day. 
I would like to use this year to do as much things as possible to have a better idea of where I want to see myself in a few years, or just after graduating from LCC. 
I would say my dream job would be to have an online printing shop to still be able to create and to design things in my own style. It is really important for me to be able to express myself in my work and to enjoy it fully. In parallel to this, I would love to be able to work for people as a freelancer maybe. I love the mix of having something very personal that resemble me and to be able to adapt myself to customers. 

-

Fantine Dubreuil,
​GMD