Summer

Belated Beginning

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Hey all! With Madison charging full speed ahead, I’ve been thinking about how I’ll be using this summer for myself as well. I admit, I wasn’t as strict with myself as I had hoped (as all my previous summers have been), but I hope that if I set up some kind of defined goal and structure, it’ll be easier to see what I need to do to get there. And perhaps also have some fun in the meantime.

Lately I’ve been struggling a lot with where I’m headed. I’ve realized that I’ve had a lot of interests: photography, animation, fashion, glass, programming, language…but I don’t feel like I really own any of them. I’ve realized that’s because I haven’t really given myself over to them; I’ve been kind of keeping them around, enjoying in the potential possibilities in all of them, but that’s not fulfilling and giving each the time they need.

Thus, for this summer, I’m just going to focus on one thing. I’m just going to do programming, specifically Processing, and learn all that I can to use it, to misuse it, to turn it and to twist it and to play with it. The structure is only week-long projects (to keep them short and sweet): conception by Sunday and publication by the following Saturday. It’ll be open-topic, and I’m going to try to post each weekly project here so there’s accountability in my progress. So far I’m hoping to sustain this structure for at least a month (while I’m in Providence), but things might change when I go home in August. Perhaps the projects will double, two a week, or it draws out longer, I don’t know. But for now, I think I’m going to give this one a run.

[Madison] Letter to GISP crew – Beginning of summer reflections

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Hello GISP crew!

This beginning of the summer reflections is probably more abrupt than you and I may have liked but I needed a place to talk about an abrupt notice I’ve received so here it is.

So I’ve been quite suddenly informed today from the store design department that I am actually only allowed to work for 30 hours a week, not the 40 hours I’ve been doing. I’ve been really enjoying my experience at Michael Kors so I was quite bummed out this evening that I lost potential 110 hours of work experience (and also frankly pay…) that I could have gotten.

While thinking of how I could spend my now free Friday in a productive manner and turn this disappointing news into a positive opportunity, I remembered our last discussion at the Met about regularly posting on this blog about what we’re doing this summer. (which I believe was Janice’s suggestion?)

I’m going to come up with a more specific goal on a later posting but one task I thought of doing every Friday is visiting various stores in New York.

You guys may or may not know this but from the various categories in design of space, my main interest has been retail design. This started when I was given a book on store design for inspiration and reference while I was putting together the application portfolio. I think back then I was simply attracted by the beauty and glamour of it but my interest grew as I started thinking about how the space is supporting the product, the brand, and the company philosophy. I also found the specificity of the audience for this type of space very interesting. I had always seen myself working with retail specifically which is why I applied to a lot of the store design internships this summer and ended up at Michael Kors.

So I am going to do some research online as well as ask the people I work with to gather a list of well designed stores. Every Friday I will make a trip to see at least one and before that weekend ends I’ll make a posting about my trip. I hope this makes me more productive and I’m also excited to hear from you guys too about whatever you want to share whether that be an amazing dinner you had or a rant about something frustrating like the one I’ve written in the beginning. I missed this space.

Love,

Madison