Name: Matt Walkerdine
Graduated: 2005
AVCE in Art and Design
BA Product Design Sheffield Hallam

What was your background?

I knew by my GCSEs that I didn’t want to do anything but art and I couldn’t fill enough subjects to do A-levels. I did an AVCE in Art and Design at a technical college – this was four days a week and structured like a Foundation course.

How did your work progress through your AVCE?

The AVCE was such a good year. You experimented with different practices before specialising – I specialised in Textiles before applying to Sheffield Hallam to do a degree in Product Design.

What did you get to do on your course?

Some people were quite technical, and made power tools and Mp3 players. A small group of people made homewares and were more conceptual. I could integrate textiles into my work - it was still product design in a loose sense.

What did you do after your degree?

We had a degree show at Sheffield Hallam and a show at New Designers. A Sheffield design company came to the degree show and offered me a job! I had a lot of responsibility straight away, receiving briefs and taking part in brainstorming sessions. The job involved a lot of Graphic Design and we also got to work with lots of different materials such as ceramics. Half the team came from a Product Design background and the other half were engineers – we were lucky because we were responsible for the creative stuff at the beginning of the design process.

When did you decide to make a career change?

As soon as I started that job I got into drawing and producing fanzines. Friends who were holding gigs let me put a table out to distribute them – it’s a great way of getting your work out there. You can also give fanzines out free in shops, they’re cheap to produce and you can put your contact details on them.

Having quit Product Design my work is now very self motivated. I have done a lot of posters, have produced work for Don’t Panic and badges for a company called Stereohype as well as Illustration for Rant Magazine and some work for the British Film Institute. Some of the work is unpaid but not all - I now fund myself by working part time in a shop.

Is self marketing important and how do you do it?

I made a long, thin bookmark, poster and pin badges and sent them to illustration companies and magazines so they could see what I was about. I would say go onto blogs like www.itsnicethat.com – these showcase a lot of new Graphic Designers, Artists and Illustrators. I have built a website off my own back, it definitely helps to have this.

Is a degree necessary to be an Artist/Designer?

One of my qualms is that some people think that if you’re not educated in illustration then you can’t fulfil illustration briefs. I have been asked to do things for magazines and then they’ve asked to see my qualifications and haven’t gotten back to me. However I do believe a degree is not essential in the slightest. I am always careful not to label myself as an ‘Illustrator’ or a ‘Product Designer’, there’s no reason you need to be pigeonholed because of your education.