Location, Location, Location

You are listening to Working File, a podcast about design practice and its relationship with the world. My name is Andy Mangold.

And I'm Maurice Cherry, filling in for Matt McInerney.

This episode is all about design cities and was organized entirely by Maurice.

What makes cities good for designers and what cities are best in terms of working, living, and playing?

Have you tried to move, Maurice?

You know that's a good question. You'll have to listen to the episode to find out.

It's called a teaser.

So, hello everybody! We've got three new contributors here today. We're gonna be talking about design cities, creative cities; what makes a city good for a designer; what makes a good design city, creative city. We're gonna talk about what that actually means. Does it mean places that have the best work? Places with the most opportunities, with great resources, with the best education? We're talking to people that are in three separate locations here so if everyone wants to introduce themselves. Jamal, you start if off.

Hi, my name is Jamal Collins. I'm from Cleveland, Ohio. I'm a designer. I have 17 years of experience. The industry wasn't going good for me so I had landed into an uncomfortable role of a teaching role that's really not my trade. I started taking off in a leadership role. With that, I started a program teaching at-risk youth graphic design, but not only graphic design, the principles of graphic design. I saw that they needed more than that so I just talked to them about entrepreneurship, social responsibility. I get into creating a lot of content with the guys. I use the term designer 'cause I'm doing video, audio. I'm raising a lot of awareness. I've got some local attention on the news and the paper a couple of times. Also got some national attention at the Guardian. So I do a lot of exposure. I take 'em on creative field trips and just really try to do as much as I can with the youth. I travel around to seven, eight locations. I'm in the housing projects, I'm all over the place. I'm in the suburbs. So just really trying to spread the word on getting these guys used to the creative field and giving them some exposure to this stuff.

Kim, how about you?

Yes, my name is Kim Green. I'm with KGCre8tive and I am based in Bozeman, Montana. I've been graphic designing for about 18 years now, started in print production at the school paper in Colorado and recently moved to Bozeman probably about 10 years ago in a new adventure, a lifestyle choice I think and just been bouncing out of freelance and agency jobs here and there, just depending on where the work is. It's been interesting and I've seen a lot so it's kinda cool. But, yeah, that gives me the... It's what I do.

All right. And Richard?

Hi, my name is Richard Wade Morgan and I run and operate Studio Wade, which is an independent brand and design consultancy here in Atlanta, Georgia. I'm just a simple farm boy delightfully hell-bent on using design as a force for change.

Nice. Starting off with Richard, actually he was who I got the idea to do this episode from. We were out in AIGA Studio Owners Roundtable meeting and the topic of design cities just briefly came up as it relates to freelancing and design commerce and it sounds like everyone has some experience with how it's been for them locally. So let's touch on that. What does your local market look like for designers that might be looking for work?

Yeah. Well, in Atlanta I can personally attest to that there are a lot of experienced folks plus a lot of a heavy amount of student population intermingling. So it's a lot of very experienced people versus a lot of junior experienced people because Atlanta's really a transit city. It's sort of a transit hub and a lot of talent will come for a few years and then leave and they go to New York for a bigger experience or San Francisco. It's really an interesting divide but we have a lot of portfolio schools here. We have SCAD Portfolio Center, Creative Circus, and all the local universities just pump out such great design talent and oftentimes they choose to go to some big challenges in New York and all over the place. I've been finding after about two years freelancing here, my first year was a bunch of in-house stuff.

It was going through a few agencies, just doing anything from pitch work to just production design before finally finding what my little market was I wanted to exist in and that was non-profit and brand design and just helping people make their community to be a better place. It's really just been touch-and-go, learning as you go kind of thing and it's interesting. A lot of designers that I know that are freelance here in Atlanta, they sort of have an entrepreneurial spirit. So it's kind of a weird 'be-a-Renaissance person' practicing and it's outside the normal bounds of graphic design. Like my friend, Sarah Lawrence, she does all sorts of community engagement and also does just branding, production, and advertising for small businesses to big start-up companies. And she just does the most diverse amount of work I've ever seen, and you can't really pin her down for a style or a speciality so it's quite interesting. It's a big melting pot here in Atlanta for both experience and for business that I've found.

I agree with that. I'm here in Atlanta as well and there certainly is that big mix of students and experienced people. We've also got a lot of Fortune 500 companies here, so you can't have people that will just stay in one in-house production kind of a track. You've got agencies here: JWT, BBDO. You've got a lot of smaller local agencies. Then of course the entrepreneurs, the people that have their own studios and things, so you can really carve out a niche here. But I find that when it comes to work, because there's so many people, it's difficult in terms of finding the right kind of work. I feel like there's a lot of grunt work.

Yes, I would agree.

Like finding the right work that can sustain you can be a challenge. Kim, you're in Montana which I don't think we really hear from at all in design conversations, so I'm super curious to hear about what it's like out there.

Yeah, no, absolutely. Good question actually 'cause I had moved from Denver so I got to see a little bit of the city and then Bozeman. Well, there's a university here, an art school. MSU has a wonderful art school so we see a lot of the new designers in the market. So it's a very flooded market with young designers which is great, they have a lot of good energy. There are, I would say, less experienced designers here. It's just a very competitive market. [chuckle] There's plenty of work but I do see maybe undervalued a little bit. A lot of people are willing to work for free. It's a tricky place. It's like what was mentioned just a minute ago where it's a lot of the smaller jobs. There's not a ton of the consistent work, which is challenging, which it was why since being here, I've bounced between agency work, unemployment, and then going back to freelancing. Just trying to figure it out and I think when I speak with other designers from the area it's very similar. We kinda have each other's back. It's a small community. We don't have AIGA or any of the big well-known communities here. So it's hard, I think. It helps a little bit but yeah, there's definitely work. [chuckle]

And now, Jamal, you've had to, like I have as well, had to carve out your own place after it seemed like the market wasn't really that conducive to work somewhere on a full-time basis. Is that right?

Yeah, correct. It's weird, I'm a little older so I've seen the industry change. I've graduated in '97 and there was a lot of work. I worked at PricewaterhouseCoopers. I worked there for 10 years and a brain guy in Miami just came down from New York, the next thing I know they was outsourcing stuff to India, which was cool for them. They made the branding guidelines a cookie-cutter package and it put me out of work eventually. The field is dominantly white male, there's not a lot of black designers working in the field as well. And I think as a community wise, I think that a lot of the designers and creatives are spread out. So one of my goals is trying to get people together, to come together, to bring some awareness of what's going on. That is, there's designers over here, photographers over there.

A lot of things that I was seeing, which is like repetitive jobs, like someone else was just saying like, just the same companies, a lot of high turnaround jobs. So I had to, like you said, I had to do something outside my comfort zone, I started consulting. So I do a lot of one-on-one consulting, I do photography gigs, personal branding. So I pushed heavy on the social networks, analytics, LinkedIn. I have a vlog on YouTube, so I'm doing a vlog every Saturday. What happened was, I'm really no different than your ordinary educator, but what I do is I bring a camera set on my classroom so you can actually see me interact with my class.

You can see the content that I'm giving 'em. You can see the morals and the values outside of just the design work. So that's where I differentiate myself from other people. Being out, just work around the clock actually 'cause I'm editing video, this takes eight hours. I gotta record, I'm taking kids on field trips. So this is part of what it is now. So this is one of the key things that I'm telling the youth now is that you can't rely on a resume and bullet points, you gotta have some type of content, they gotta see your bullet points, either that's audio, podcast like this, video or a blog. I'm also writing.

Now based on where you are, and this is a question for everyone, do you feel supported as a designer? Do you feel like there's a community that you can tap into when you need it?

Now I do, yes. But I do a lot of legwork so I'm constantly at art shows. I'm constantly at photography gigs. I have relationships for architects now. I'm at the art museum. I know people who do programming. So, just a lot of non-profit. 'Cause I work with the non-profit sector, and being in the paper and being in the news now is easy for me to form these relationships. I'm bringing kids to design conferences. No one's doing this. So I'm bringing kids from the inner city to Weapons of Mass Creation to see guys like me give keynotes. I'm bringing these guys and I'm talking about these guys on stage. So I'm opening up to discussion. I was on... I don't know if you guys are probably familiar with Adventures in Design with Mark Brickey. I was on there with question. I did a podcast with him last year on Weapons of Mass Creation on the stage. And he was asking me, "Well, what can we do to help?" And I would just wanna open up this avenue so designers like us can jump into this mentorship role and go down and bring these guys along, because I wanna give a shoutout to two guys that I've been mentoring real closely. They're 14 year-old photographers and their work is amazing.

I got grownup people on my Instagram like, "We wanna hang out with the two 14 year-olds." I want people to be able to give these guys that mentorship that I ain't have. I've been doing some keynotes lately about design and social change and the thing is, is that what drives me the most is that I didn't have a mentorship, so I had to find my own way through college, my own way through PricewaterhouseCoopers. I didn't have nobody. No partners or no managers, no senior accountants coming to help and then guide me along the way on what's practical, what's not practical, you should do this, you should do that. I'm just shooting a resume into a blackhole waiting on somebody to come respond to that. And I think those days is long behind me.

Kim, how about you?

That's a great question actually. I think it depends on where you are in your career. So for students I would say, or younger, entry level designers, just definitely Montana State University's probably the biggest support for students as a community, just because they have such a great program here. Some of the instructors, I volunteer over there and do portfolio reviews, but they really have a great program with getting students involved with internships and then setting 'em up for a career there beyond. However, for senior designers or more in-house design or agencies and stuff like that, it's really just a matter of networking and finding designers. That's the only way I know to find them here. I have a group of probably about five designers that are all about equal. We get together and talk shop and that's been great. It's almost a lifeline. It's cool to connect with them, hear what their struggles are, who they're working with, which is funny in such a small pot because you know you're competing against them too. So yeah.

And, Richard, I know you're pretty well connected here in Atlanta.

Yeah. I completely empathize with Jamal. When I first started, it was really hard. I will say that about five years ago, Atlanta's design scene wasn't as welcoming and completely open as it is now. I'm proud and happy to say it has really changed. Like, all the schools are connected, agencies talk to each other. Everyone in the industry is just more easily... Everyone's friends on Instagram now that works at different places, and it's a lot more open. When I first came to Atlanta, I struggled so much just sending my resume to places, cold-calling people, and I really just didn't know how to communicate and it was really difficult, but the AIGA chapter here was giving a few events every now and then and my friend Bora Shehu and I... She's in New York now, we both looked at each other and said, "We have to engage and if there's no community that we can find, we need to make the community. We need to try as hard as we can to just get people to engage with each other and then you can share experiences." So we started a happy hour program. We both went to the University of Georgia. Go, Dawgs!

And we knew how to have a good time, so we said, "All right, well, let's pick a bar or whoever wants to open their studio, we'll bring some beers and let's just talk and chat and get people whether you're a designer or not, just come out and talk creative shop." It does a good thing to get people out of their studios and out of their homes. Don't just grind at the end of the day, go meet up with a few of your creative friends and engage because it keeps you in the loop. It does really good for your career. I love that Jamal said he was in touch with architects and video production people, and I found exactly that same sentiment. [chuckle] It's really funny to say, but I don't feel like a graphic designer at all. I feel like a generalist. I write for a local arts publication and that came out of just networking and my editor, Laura, trusting me saying, "You're really passionate about this. You should write." And I said, "No, I'm crap at writing! You don't wanna read my stuff!" But little things like that give you opportunity.

I think going to what was said about Montana State, like, absolutely, student communities should engage and do engage really well with their students. And it's a responsibility, but what Jamal was saying too, on us as professionals, to take time out of our days to make that effort. Pool people in or arrange stuff and give some two cents in and you'll get 10-fold back from the community. You just gotta try. Sure, you won't get it right the first chance. You may fall down 10 times in a row with nobody going to an event, but eventually somebody will answer that Facebook event and you'll have a good time and you'll get a rich communal experience out of it, and then you will begin to see the creative community around you, whether they're designers or not. I think that's important once you see five people in a circle chatting about, "Oh, my god, that new development is either really cool or total crap or something relevant to the city." Yeah.

This was another question for everyone, what do you think makes a city good for designers? This is a question that I see a lot on design forums and things. People are thinking about moving to another place or visiting another place and they wanna know how is it good for designers? Of course, there's a lot of different factors that can go into that but for each of you when you think about what makes a city good for designers what do you take into consideration?

I can jump in and I would say the community. I'm connecting to Columbus because Columbus is two hours away and they started... Two guys that are good friends of mine named Marshall and Corey, they started their own design conference. So this design conference started with people of color and because they felt that there was a need that they wasn't seeing at other design conferences and they're closely based to Ohio State. So I'm trying to connect Cleveland with Columbus and Cincinnati and just have a collective of people having these type of discussions, these type of podcasts and seeing if there's some opportunities available. I've been working with a lot of the non-profits and really giving guys awareness to say, "Well, there may not be a job but you can create one or you should create some content."

I actually had a opportunity to work with Digital C and CMHA, and I've been teaching senior citizens how to use the internet through this agenda called Connected Unconnected. And it's the same spiel I give to the youth is, let them know that they can have a shot. What they did was, with an apartment complex they gave them high-speed internet and if they complete their program, four sessions, they give them a free computer. So I was talking to them about any jobs they wanted to start or any careers they wanna get into. Just talking to them like creating some content around their interests. I don't know if I answered the question but...

No, you did. It sounds like awareness is when you think of a design city that's really what factors in whether or not the city as a whole is aware of design culture or design programs or things like that.

Yeah. I can speak highly for the education 'cause I'm with the youth in the inner city, they really don't know anything about the old status quo of just go to school. They don't know anything about creating content. They don't know about monetizing their YouTube channel. They don't know about design videos. These guys got iPhones. 'Cause I'm bringing in top illustrators. Like you said, I'm able to make some phone calls now so I'm bringing in top illustrators who own companies, guys coming in talking to these guys. I'm trying to get their parents involved. I'm trying to get these guys to ask for the right stuff. Stop asking for Xbox's and tennis shoes. Start asking for iMacs, drones, cameras. Start your channel, come to this conference. So it's a lot of work that's involved in this because these guys are like 14, 15. I'm gonna let them know that they can start something now. I think we have beautiful time as a designer because I can create so much content. I do my own video, I do my own marketing, it's no middle man, so I don't need nobody to help me with my marketing, my video, my website. So I feel like the youth should be able to set up their Wordpress, they should be able to fly drones, they should know about 3D printing. Even a senior citizen, everybody should know about all of this stuff but, I ain't gonna talk too long. [chuckle]

Anyone else wanna jump in?

I'd like to second that community. That to me is number one by far, having that community of graphic designers and resources and a collaboration if you will amongst designers 'cause I think it strengthens the industry as a whole, and then also in the consumers' eye or the clients' eye that we are united as one. That being probably my number one and then maybe continued education and resources being the second in what I would look for, and I think it's important.

Absolutely. I would completely agree to what Kim and Jamal said. I would like to add as well that... And it may have been just from a few years of just knowing and looking at what businesses are popping up versus failing. I think if you look at your business scene and how much growth economically has been happening... Like Atlanta has the Atlanta Business Chronicle, and I don't follow it, I am totally not a business person [chuckle], not endorsing that but Atlanta has been growing rapidly for about 10 years and that's been a good sign to me that there's possibility there and the entrepreneur in me tells me, "Okay, you need to find some networking event or go find a way to get in here and sell these people design." And I think design is really hard to sell in the South because it's not as common in the culture as in the northeast or the west coast.

And also hungry people, people that are really, really trying to make something happen whether it's a small project or... I've seen it in the restaurant industry here in Atlanta. Atlanta is a top five food city and all these young chefs are just kicking all sorts of ass, like putting all their savings into opening these incredible concept restaurants and they utilized designers to make their message possible. It's all stamped over the city. I think as well, if there's a strong business sector plus a strong arts community, and Atlanta has both of those, and in the middle of that is where designers can exist and they can do anything. As designers, we have the great privilege of being able to jump in and out of many roles. We're very nimble. Yeah, I think all of those factors make a city good for designers but also a potentially good city for designers.

Now, we're all in different locations. Richard and I here in Atlanta; Jamal's in Cleveland; Kim is in Bozeman. If someone were interested in moving to your city, I know we've given these reasons as to what makes a good design city, but if someone were interested in moving to where you are, what would you tell them to draw them in? Like, if they wanna come and set up as a designer, what are the pros and cons of where you're at?

I will start off. I would say the pros are, people have to be willing to get out their comfort zone and come out and meet people. That's the missing piece. 'Cause I'm just relying on my work history and my big names, the companies I work for to try and land me a job, but that wasn't enough. So it's all about building relationships from, that's just it point blank, building relationships and then you can come in and recommended. "I can make a phone call," "here's an opportunity over here," "take a look at this person" 'cause every time I go out somebody's introducing me to somebody new that's doing some cool work. And you get a lot of inspiration from that, too. Like I said, I'm not just with designers, I'm with architects, these non-profits doing cool things, finding new guys and just helping lead the way. I would definitely say that I would not rule out creating your own thing, starting your own company, and just trying to crush it from there.

I would say coming out here, just like you said, network, get involved in the community, connect with other designers. When I first moved here, and I'm still trying to fit into this region a little bit, but just feeling comfortable to email some other agencies. Take 'em to lunch. Get to know them. It is a very small, tight group here and they're very friendly that you just have to get in, and you talk to 'em and you all of a sudden realize how small it is and you're accepted. There's tons of work. There's always work. I think in any area, there's work. There's small businesses. There's work. It's just a matter of getting in there, building those relationships, establishing trust with people around you and then becoming a resource, I think.

I agree with Kim. Exactly, becoming a resource, something that somebody can use. To build those relationships with people other than just design agency. Sure, that's a wonderful place to hit the ground running and it's definitely guaranteed that you know the work. It's not like you're going to pitch a giant law firm, which is incredibly intimidating. I did it one time, and I don't wanna do it again. [chuckle] If you bring your passion, especially to a city like Atlanta, a community will eat it up. I will say that even though Atlanta is quickly becoming a little more financially expensive and the cost of living here is going up every year, the city is so warm to new concepts.

We have a program here called Living Walls, and Monica Campana runs it. It beautifies the city with murals and brings in local and international artists to come and just paint our city over. It went away for a year or two. And she went to go be the director of Mural Arts Program in Philadelphia, and she brought it back this year and moved it to the Buford Highway area in the northeastern corner of Atlanta, where our big immigrant community is. It blew up. Everyone embraced it. Again, people had thought it never left. And so if you make a lasting mark in a city like Atlanta and you know that community is there, if you make a mark or if you try something, people will be responsive to it. So you literally just have to try it. Think really hard and well about your idea and toss around a few friends, get some credit, but just put it out there and spread it as much as you can to your network like Jamal was saying.

Have any of you ever wanted to move?

So let me jump in.

Yeah.

I was trying to move to Atlanta, actually. Yeah, I was still at PricewaterhouseCooper so this was like right before the real estate bubble hit. This was like in 2006. I was working at PricewaterhouseCoopers, I had just newly got married. Me and my wife had a one-year-old. She was going to Cleveland State so I didn't wanna uproot her, so I wanna be suave about getting a job in Atlanta. This is a crazy story, but I had a knee injury from playing basketball and I know I could go out on a short-term disability but they're coming far. So in between scheduling my surgery and therapy, I was flying, catching buses, and driving back and forth to Atlanta. The thing was that, I have pushed my resume and said that I was working at PricewaterhouseCoopers in Atlanta. The thing was, I was getting more interviews and more buy-ins at that time from Atlanta than I was in Cleveland, I wasn't getting anything. But in Atlanta, I was scheduling almost like three interviews a week.

I had a cousin that lived down there, but I never landed anything, and I just didn't wanna uproot my family and I ended up finding a job here, which was cool. But the economy started tanking, and I was only at those shops less than a year at two companies. I was with a big cable company called... I was with Time Warner Cable. I wasn't even there long enough to go to the Christmas party. They did a bunch of hiring and they did a bunch of firing.

Oh, man.

Yeah, yeah. I didn't come.

And now, Kim, you moved to Bozeman from Montana, so something I guess. Can you talk a little bit about that?

Sure. Actually it was my husband's job that we moved here. I had to look up where it was. But I think people here move here for the lifestyle. It's a beautiful place, and it probably wouldn't have been a top pick for design, but now that I'm into the community and I've gotten involved in the school, the local school, I fell in love with it. Just the more people you know, the more comfortable it gets. Sure, I've thought about moving, I've never actually lived in a "design" city like San Francisco or New York. But I think with that comes... That's a big step. [laughter] So it's always there, but right now everything seems to be good, and I like my clients, and that's a good place to be.

Yeah. I went to UGA in Athens, and I just landed in Atlanta with a last-minute phone call job. I called so many people after I graduated that I was in Atlanta, and luckily something at CNN stuck, and I've been here ever since. I've had definitely a lot of strong feelings of wanting to move, and that came from just being young and hungry. I was really trudged down in a few places, and I hadn't really developed my own personal design working mind yet. And especially as a queer person in the South, I definitely have always wanted to leave and try living in another part of the country. I'm from right outside Savannah, Georgia originally so there's this push/pull tendency with me. But I don't see myself moving any time soon. My boyfriend's family is here, and they're up in Charlotte. Atlanta, it's kind of like, I can't remember who said it, but if you really love a city, you will hate it absolutely to its bone half the time you're there.

And my friend Sarah Lawrence, I think she put it best when she said, "Goddamn, I love this city. You will hate it, but you will also love it." The community that I have found here, I found it, it feels like home and I don't think I want to leave, but if something comes up, I'd like to go to the mountains in Montana. Hi, Kim, I'd like to come visit.

Hey, Jamal, I'd like to come to Cleveland. But I'd like to see different parts of the country design-wise. Yeah, I've had those urges. Go to New York, go to Fresco, go to Chicago, go to Austin. It's there, I just have an insatiable wanderlust, and that's just me being young and stupid. [laughter] Yeah.

Well, I think it feels like once you put down roots somewhere, it does make it harder to just pick up and leave if it's for an opportunity or something. I know that I... [chuckle] it's funny you mention that about Atlanta 'cause I had definitely wanted to move several times, especially in my 20s. I was like in my 20s approaching 30, I was really actively ardently looking to move to New York. Like I had talked to a broker, I had flown up there and looked at apartments. I was really like, "I'm gonna make it happen." But then this was also maybe the first year or two that I had my studio. One of the advantages of being here in Atlanta is the cost of living, and I don't know if I would have been able to keep my studio as it is right now for as long as I have in any other city but Atlanta because of that mix of cost of living, and opportunities, and education, and all this sort of stuff. But there is always that part in the back of my mind that's like, "What if I was just in New York for a month? What would it be like?" Or, "What if I was just in San Francisco for a month to see what the opportunities are?"

But I've had that love/hate relationship with Atlanta. I feel like now it's certainly veering... I think the older I get, it's veering more towards, I really like being here. The weather, for what it's worth, even though the weather's been weird this year, but the weather, the cost of living, I'm fairly close to home, I'm from Alabama so it all works out in my favor. But I think with anyone that has a business or if you're a designer you're just trying to find your place, it's hard to dig out what that niche is gonna be, especially if you are more of a generalist or something like that.

Absolutely.

That's what attracted me to Atlanta because it's the same cost of living that's up here in the Midwest. The weather, you don't get the snow and all of that stuff. So that's why I was attracted to Atlanta plus I was getting more traction when I was looking at the time.

Jamal, you mentioned Atlanta. Is there a city any of you would like to just try your hand at if you were a designer, doing what you do?

Yes. [laughter] San Francisco. Let's see, Seattle, probably. Yup. Over there. And I don't know why. Just it's close. [laughter] A lot of designers go over there and there seems to be more bigger companies. Some of the agencies I've worked with in town that are successful work with big companies there, so that's probably why that came up.

Ideally, I don't really have one in mind but I would love to just be super minimalistic and be able to flow between two if possible. I got two bags, my two carry-ons with computer laptop, and be able to move. [laughter] So I'm more like a Uber, AirBnB type.

I like that, yeah. I've really been sold recently on Minneapolis and Chicago. My best friend went to grad school at U of Iowa and graduated recently and he just had such good things to say about the Midwest, and everyone tells me about the Midwest and how awesome it is, and everyone's friendly as hell, and I'm like, "Man, I just need to go be a midwestern person in Chicago, Minneapolis, Kansas City, Cleveland, Columbus." That's where I would really try. Maybe I'll go on vacation there. I need to save some money. I might do a little round trip and do that.

You should. Maybe come on Sept... We got a big conference, Weapons of Mass Creation, that's set in September. Columbus has a cool design conference called CCF, that's Creative Control Fest, that's in August. So, check those out.

Absolutely. Thank you.

I can vouch for Weapons of Mass Creation 'cause it's really good too.

Yeah, I think I heard a few people in Atlanta talk about that, and that's... Yeah, a few MailChimp people I think, and that gives me some good thoughts too.

I'm actually going to give a keynote about Creative South this year.

Oh, welcome.

Oh, nice.

Yeah, yeah. Actually I was supposed to do it last year. I don't know if you guys remember, but a crazy storm hit the Midwest. It was like a trickle-down effect and it threw out a whole bunch of flights with Delta and I wasn't able to fly out, so this is my second attempt going down there. I don't know if you remember that Atlanta's airport was shut down for a whole weekend.

Oh, yeah.

Oh, that's right.

Yeah, I remember that, yeah.

Yeah, that was the first time I think in its history it had ever, ever been shut down 'cause that place never closes. I think that's kind of...

I couldn't get a flight out. So yeah, I had shot a video and they did the video on stage for me, and a lot of people couldn't make it down. It was horrible. So when it's cool, I'm going this year. So, I'll be...

Fantastic.

Yeah, I'll be having you guys connected in woods.

I'm really curious about Seattle. Can we mention Seattle? Seattle has Microsoft, they've got Amazon. They've got Nintendo. They have a bunch of huge tech companies there. I've visited Seattle once, it was years ago. I was in college when I visited, and I really liked it. I like going to Pike Place Market. I'd saw the Space Needle. I thought downtown was really nice. This was like 2002 or something like that. Things probably have changed a lot since then, but I remember really liking the city. Even people that I've talked to since then, other designers, it just sounds like Seattle has a really interesting and quirky design culture similar to Portland, but not as expensive, I guess. So I'm really curious about Seattle. I would like to try it out. It's so far geographically from [laughter] Atlanta. It feels like it would be a big departure, but I'm super interested in checking out Seattle.

Yeah, me too.

Yeah, Seattle even has a design district, I think. I don't know. I don't know if Atlanta has a design district or not. This is a question for everyone, in each of your cities, are there specific design enclaves or creative enclaves like that?

I think in Atlanta, there's a cheesy group of developers that tried to make the west side design district happen, but really that's west midtown. It's just a bunch of small shops and it's really cute and there's octane over there, but I think everyone's just trying to hug the belt line now and get in on that sweet, cool west coast thinking in those spaces. Every little design agency, everyone's going to Ponce City Market, and that's personally not my style. I prefer a nice junky warehouse with just shit on the walls like artists. I need a skate ramp in there, like a practice space for musicians. That's where I'd be happy. Like vine's growing out the window. A little bit like the goat farm, like some barren extra back spaces at the goat farm.

I was gonna say the goat farm.

Yeah.

We have a place here called, The Goat Farm. I think goats are actually there, right?

Yeah, goats and chickens and I think a mule, but I know it's a metal mule. It's a metal sculpture of a mule. Sorry, I'm from a farm. I'm weird.

No, no, no, that makes me wanna consider different design cities, it sounds pretty cool.

Some design. We have a few pockets. We're a small town. I don't know what the population is, it's like 40,000 something. We have a downtown area that's gonna be where all the agencies are. It's a hot spot if you're gonna do any big time work, that's where you're gonna wanna be. We also have a canary district, which reminded me of what you were talking about with warehouse. It's a trend here to convert one of those grain elevators into office spaces and things like that so it's pretty cool. Those are kind of an up and up trend coming, and that's where I would go if I were to pick a place. But yeah, there's a few pockets, I wouldn't say they're huge but you just wanna be in the downtown area.

I wanna say the same thing. Downtown area got these sections of coffee shops. We got the Cavs, LeBron and stuff so downtown has a lot to offer. Rock 'n roll. We got a lot of museums and cool spaces so they trying to build it up. I'm in the trenches though so I'm [laughter] trying to get these youth to raise their awareness to let them know about opportunities and options they have. That's the overall issue. These guys wait for college, I think it's gonna be too late.

Is there something that you would want in your city that you think would make it easier for designers?

Great question. It's kinda hard. [chuckle]

One of the big ones that comes to mind actually is a struggle that I'm currently having, if you don't mind me jumping in. I would say a lot of the creative temp agencies. I don't know how much you guys have had experience with that but that was a huge resource for me when I lived in Denver. As you guys probably know and can relate, with freelance comes the ebbs and the flows of the feast or famine workflow, right? As much as I try to make it an even thing, there's times of quiet and I'll send them like, "I need some work." And you have to be local to get those. Like, Seattle's got a big one that's the one that I mentioned earlier. Denver, I can't recall their names right now but that's a big one. Just people that work with creative types to place them on temporary jobs or consulting.

I can't speak of a lot about this but I have some mutual friends on the forefront of really fighting for grant money that big companies have the most control over the money and grassroot guys aren't able to even touch the grants at all or not get enough grant money. So there's been a lot of open discussions and panels, and this just has been going back and forth trying to get access to this money and get the opportunities that the big Rock 'n Roll Hall of Fame has and the stadium. So this is the one thing that they've been really pounding, having discussions with these different organizations trying to get access to this grant money.

I definitely know that in Atlanta there's really an interesting divide in the creative community about where people work and a lot of agencies here, like traditional ad marketing agencies, a lot are satellite offices of different companies based in other cities. There's the Razorfishes and J. Walter Thompsons, but there's also a lot of homegrown places like there's Son&Sons, ChronoLogic, these really wonderful tiny brand houses that do good and then you have these big start-up companies that value design and it really give back to their community. I think MailChimp has done so much for Atlanta in sponsoring events, local education, small businesses. I think I'd like to see more of those. MailChimp's been holding the banner pretty high. There's Cabbage and Calendly and a few other places, but we're currently in a fight to get Amazon to come to Atlanta against Denver, actually. There was talk that they may not pick Atlanta because our transit is a nightmare which that's something you gotta deal with in Atlanta, but...

Yeah, that's true.

If Amazon would like to choose to come down, I think Atlanta would be a really wonderful city to welcome them and there's a lot of other big tech companies would like to come too. I think that would really, really help us and really gauge Atlanta on the map for being a city with a lot of creative talent that needs a vehicle to be put in to, that can really do some good for both a big company and their local community.

Yeah, I agree with that about needing the bridge that bridge that gap. I know back when I was really working in the industry here in town, it just felt like there was this big disconnect between the larger companies, the smaller agencies and even I think for people that were just kind of, I wouldn't say super seasoned but maybe they have like about three or four years in the game. It was just really hard to try to find a good place. You didn't have businesses that really value design aesthetically, they valued it more as a commodity. And oftentimes that would be to the detriment of not even knowing what it is that you do, like you could be a web designer but then they want you to interview for a network technician position or something like that because the recruiters think that, "Oh, it's all the web and technology. You all do the same thing," when it's totally different. But I feel like that is starting to change certainly as more... I think once we got a SCAD campus here, I feel like that's gonna change the tide a little bit.

Absolutely. You hit it right on the head. I think this applies to all Southern cities and definitely probably some Midwestern cities too, places that are not defined by the dominant coastal towns that are full of places that really value design, have a rich history of design. Atlanta's just a big business hub, all kinds of business. Like Jamal was saying, PricewaterhouseCooper, Boston Consulting Group, a lot of places. And they just, they haven't... It's not that they don't care, they definitely know that it's there, it's just that these companies haven't been educated on what design can offer them and what our community can give back to them in tenfold. And I think companies like IBM embraced design as this beautiful chorus to success and good business, like good design equals good business is their motto.

But I think that is part in part on us as well. Like Jamal was saying, you have to give back, you have to educate, and you gotta be loud. You have to say, "We're here, here's what we can offer you." This isn't New York, [chuckle] this is the South or wherever we're at and so, we know you and we're locals, but this is why design and creative thinking, not just design, can help you in your business. And I'm glad to see Atlanta changing that way most recently in the past few years. It's definitely been on an uptake.

You bring that up and it's dead on. I almost wonder how much of that's an industry trend, because we certainly see it here in Bozeman. It's at that value, trying to convince. And I think community definitely helps with that, which is one of the other things I probably should've added with Bozeman. It doesn't have a real national community establishment. I know that there has been various attempts from two of the schools, one in Missoula and one in Bozeman to connect with the AIGA was one that I know that they've been trying to get here, and I don't know why it hasn't. But oh my gosh, I tell you. [chuckle] You're always fighting people that are willing to work for free. And it's hard to convince people, or not... To educate, that's an excellent word, on the value that's added with working with a professional designer. You know that there's a lot to it.

This can bridge into another question, but we're all talking about the importance of showing the business community the value of design. Do you find that that's something that with the work that you're doing in Cleveland that's helping?

Yes. They don't really have much choice because I make so much noise like he was saying I was saying. That's kind of funny. So just putting out a lot of content. I don't know if a lot of designers do that. It seems like I'm always working 'cause I'm always putting out a lot of content and just letting people know that I'm a consultant. 'Cause there was some other consultants, but they don't kind of... This is the thing, there's a lot of people, everybody that I meet are unique. I meet guys who have cool stories, they have cool illustrators, or their father had this connections. But people don't put up no content to let the businesses know that these guys are out here. So that's the only difference. The only difference I did was I just documented everything that I've done and showed it. That's what I've landed on the news. This is why I got the attention I got. I just want other people to just spread the word on how cool they are. That's pretty much it, I guess.

And now, here's something as a final question for everyone. Of course, we all have different roots that are keeping us where we're at geographically, but when you look at your design career and the community that's around you, what is it that makes you stay where you're at?

This is my hometown. I'm in a position of being a mentor that put me in the position of a leadership role, and it's just been my duty to help the youth, help the community, help raise awareness on these places that have lack of opportunities. This lack of opportunity leads to frustration, all this frustration leads to a lot of crime, drugs, bad attitudes, violence, all of this type of stuff. One of my main things is I feel like design is a weapon for social change and giving these guys this outlook that they can do things, I'm just trying to help prevent a lot of this lack of opportunity that's plaguing my community as it is. Guys got low test scores, guys that are disciplined and the discipline is disproportionate on all kind of levels. I just wanna help out as much as I can where I'm at. And if I see a lot of leeway here, I'll move on to other places. I just wanna spread the word.

Yeah, I agree with that. That's an absolutely wonderful reason to stay. And I definitely can echo some similar sentiments to that. But the mentorship aspect and knowing a community that you've been in for a while, that's a very powerful gravitation. I definitely feel that with Atlanta, a lot with the young, independent designer groups here and just the possibilities, you can do anything you want once you have your community. No matter what path you wanna take, if you want to help other designers or if you would just wanna be entrepreneurial and go start something, or if you just wanna design restaurants your entire life, I think absolutely, once you have even if it's just five good friends, or two good friends, or just one good friend, or somebody that you see is being successful, that keeps you going, it keeps the hunger alive in you for wanting to practice well, and practice as a content person and being wholesome in that practice too. That's what keeps me in Atlanta. Really, there's no other place like it. I'm sure it would be fun in New York, but it's just a lot that I've helped build and seen build here around me that it makes me warm and fuzzy inside.

Yeah, it's that community word that's come up again and that's a huge one for me as well. It's an intimate relationship that I have established with a lot of the design community here, and respect and trust, and that takes a while to build. That's one of the main things that keeps me here and lifestyle. Bozeman's an outdoor lifestyle, and that's always great too. Yeah, I agree.

Yeah, for me I think it's that combination of the lifestyle. I've been here for so long I'm used to it. [chuckle] And also, I've traveled to other places and I've even worked in some other places for extended amount of time and I always just find myself coming back here 'cause it just feels like home, it's always felt like this is the place where I need to sort of, I don't wanna say prove myself, I guess that's a good way to put it. But just in terms of the design work that I'm doing, this community has certainly changed so much since when I first came here and I feel like it's continuing to change through the efforts of a lot of organizations and people that are really pushing the envelope forward on how design is viewed and celebrated really in the city.

I'm really grateful to see how much change has come about in such a fairly short amount of time. And so, to hopefully see more is what makes me wanna stay, seeing what opportunities could come based on our increased awareness of design. Does anybody get our final thoughts here? Does anyone have any final words they wanna say about any kind of work that they're doing or something like that? It's your opportunity to just let our audience know more about you, where they can find you, things like that.

You could find me at my website is jayworking.com, that's J-A-Y-W-O-R-K-I-N-G, and I'm on Instagram at Jayworking. My YouTube channel is Jayworking. I would like for everybody to check my YouTube channel live, you can see the live stuff that I'm doing in the community with the youth. You can see a lot of stuff that I'm teaching them. I'm talking about social responsibility, monetizing your channels, learn to Photoshop, video and all of that stuff. I just feel like the role of a designer should shift and frankly to more of a social responsible role, and just helping the youth and guiding them into becoming the leaderships in our society. That's just my overall message. I see a lot of guys is just more selling stuff. I think we get into that role, we're providing a service, but I think that guys should come and help and mentor and point these guys into the cool stuff that we can do now.

I can be found actually online at KGCre8tive with an eight instead of an A.com, so it's K-G-C-R-E-8-T-I-V-E.com and working on a bunch of stuff. I've been doing more photography lately, which I do love, it's a complementary thing to being behind the computer, it gets me away and allows me to explore life through a lens. So I've been doing a ton of that lately as well as retail packaging and projects like that primarily through agencies right now, just a behind the scenes designer, which I love to be. I can also be found on Instagram @kgcre8tive.com or @kgcre8tive.

Yeah. I can be found at studiowade.com and Wade's my middle name, Richard Wade Morgan. And throughout Twitter and Instagram I am at Studiowade. And if there's something I could point people toward, I currently Make America Gay Again with makeamericagayagain.co and I make shiny rainbow charismatic, obnoxiously gay hats that say, "Make America Gay Again." And I sell them and give all the profits to a local homeless queer youth organization in town here called Lost and Found Youth. And their website is LNFY.org. And if anyone would love to just give a donation there, that would warm my heart, and we are gonna be having our next round of hats online within the next month here. So, yeah.

Thanks everybody for your input, I'm glad we could talk about design cities, chop it up a bit, and it's good to see what each of you are doing in each of your respective cities and hopefully for people that are listening, they can learn about them and hopefully get some more information and check 'em out.

Thank you to XYZ Type as always for sponsoring our transcripts. You can find them at xyztype.com.

And visit us at workingfile.co to listen to this episode as well as all the others, and leave us a great review on Apple podcast, just search for Working File.