MamerSass

My name is Haven DeAnglis and I am a junior Fibers major with concentrations in Sustainability and Social Practice and Experimental Fashion. During the summer of 2018, I was an intern at MamerSass Reinvented Fashions in Chincoteague, Virginia. The small business focuses on reducing textile waste, and the apparel that is sold in the store is either vintage or upcycled. I learned of the internship experience after the co-owner and designer of the business, Jamey Brittingham, reached out to the Students of Sustainability club to see if we would be interested in hosting them on their college tour. I was able to bring MamerSass to campus in the spring of 2018, and Jamey gave an inspiring artist talk about starting a small, sustainable business. They also brought along the mobile shop, so students could see the upcycled clothing creations. Before Jamey and her partner Derek came to MICA, I did research on the company and learned that they offered internships. I expressed my interested in interning with them, while communicating the plans for the artist talk, and after seeing my portfolio, I was offered the position.

MamerSass could not have been a better internship experience for my career goals. My dream after college would to have my own small business, in which I would design and make upcycled punk clothing and accessories. I was the only intern Jamey and Derek had at the time in May and June, so I was able to frequently ask questions about how to start and successfully run a business. I mainly worked with Jamey in designing and making upcycled clothing. The workroom is part of the store, so while we weren’t dealing with customers, we were busily making clothes. One of the most important takeaways I had was that working hard and being able to multi-task is key if you want your business to grow. Even though Jamey and I may spend hours making a shirt, it may only sell for $35 because customers want inexpensive clothing. The materials for upcycled fashion is free or very cheap but one has to love the labor they put into it for being your own boss means no one is giving you a steady wage. While it was a lot of work, I absolutely loved the internship and making the clothes and jewelry each day. One of the most fulfilling aspect was when a customer would buy an item I made and knew they would wearing something I created.

During most of my internship, Jamey and Derek were preparing for vending at Firefly Music Festival, which meant that a lot of clothes had to be made. Jamey and I created Festival Tops out of scrap pieces of fabric, Split Tees out of old, unwanted t-shirts, and many t-shirt shopping bags. I was also able to teach them how to screen print their logo onto t-shirts and sweatshirts, which sold well at the festival. It was cool to see that something I had learned in school was able to be implemented into another setting. After my internship was completed in June, they asked me if I would like to stay and work with them for another month and be paid! Not only was the internship an excellent learning experience, but I was able to receive a job from it, too.

Studio Rodrigo

My name is Morgan Smith, and I am a senior Graphic Design major. My previous professor, Hieu Tran, was an intern and designer at Studio Rodrigo in 2017. Knowing that I had taken on UI/UX in the past year, he mentioned that they were looking for design interns. Studio Rodrigo is primarily a product design studio, and I figured this would be a great way for me to test the UI/UX skills I’ve gathered. Hieu thankfully passed along my resume, and I even had the chance to interview with their team at the 2018 Career Fair. After going through this process and sending up a follow up email, I got to interview with other members of the team to review my work and goals as a designer. Later, I was accepted as an intern in late May of this year. 

Studio Rodrigo is a design studio located in New York that works in various fields of design including: product design, brand elements, and more. Studio Rodrigo does focus more on product design, but has a numerous amount of clients that work in different fields, and therefore need different things besides product design.

My direct supervisors were Khoi Uong and Ritik Dholakia, the founders of Studio Rodrigo. They provided me the background information on all the projects I would be working on, as well as working with me throughout completing these projects. Ritik works mostly behind the scenes and organizes what projects would be good for the Rodrigo team, and Khoi is mostly a designer at Studio Rodrigo as well.

My main responsibilities as an design intern was to work within the project’s needs. I’ve had the opportunity to work on three projects throughout my time here, all varying in different fields. One was working for Artfare, which allowed me to try UI/UX design for administrators of the app. Next, was working on social media campaigns for Democracy Works/Turbovote for this upcoming election. The last project I helped out on was working for Baby Goo Roo and trying different design directions for their next books on life as a new mom.

I am mostly proud of my work for Democracy Works/Turbovote. I had a lot of fun being the main designer for this project and creating work that was fun and exciting for something as daunting as the election. The clientele enjoyed the work as well which made me proud for creating work that an actual client enjoys.

My biggest take away from my experience is that designing takes a lot of time, and a lot of user thinking — especially in UI/UX. At MICA, I am very used to working for the screens and not for the person operating those screens. While working at Rodrigo, I’ve realized the way they work is backwards from what I’ve done at MICA. That being said, that’s one of the things I’ve learned the most, is working in that direction is crucial when it comes to product design.

New skills I’ve learned the most is that you have to think about the user and how they’re going to operate your product in the most simplest way possible. Don’t overthink the functions. Also, to speak up as an designer. Don’t be afraid to show your design decisions and stand up for them! 9 times out of 10 your supervisor and team will listen and add on how to make your decisions greater.

This internship was overall a great experience, and is one where I can say I’ve actually learned a lot. That being said, it really made me think about me as a designer and my future. I’d definitely love to try my hand at product design any chance I get (to build my skills), but I found myself wanting to do more branding related things. In the past, I was very focused on doing product design and making a career out of it. But, this experience has made me realize that I am good at product design, but excel better in other fields of design. For my career, I’d love if I was a designer that had the opportunity to work in as many fields as I can, including product design. But, I no longer choose to focus my career on product design and more on brand oriented design that has the possibility of including product design.

Paperwhite Studio

During the Summer of 2018, I was a graphic design intern for Paperwhite Studio, a design and branding company in Brooklyn, New York. As a Graphic Design MFA student at MICA, I have a strong interest in identity design and packaging, especially in the food industry. Thus, while searching for an internship for the summer, I specifically looked for studios that have done projects in this food-GD area.

Paperwhite is prestigious in the industry of restaurant/cafe branding and food packaging, and also famous for helping small restaurants explode in popularity thanks to a strong conceptual and carefully crafted design that connected with their audience. Jackʼs Wife Freda, by CHLOE, and The Sosta were three signature cases designed by Paperwhite.


To prepare for this experience, I have spoken personally with Laureen Moyal, the co-founder of Paperwhite Studio, about the job, and I also have contacted to one past intern and one current intern at Paperwhite to ask about their experience. Both of them gave me very positive feedback.

As an intern, I was given the same opportunities as the other designers in the studio. My job includes branding concepts for startups and new projects, designing deliveries for byChloe, and working on illustrations for other projects. For new projects, everyone will work on their own concept and Laureen will pick five to six versions to present to the clients. Two of my designs were chosen by the clients. The thing that I am most proud of is that my branding solution for Marmalade, a furniture brand by Bed Bath and Beyond, including logos, illustrations, and packaging, got chosen and I designed the brand guideline for this brand. Another major thing I worked on is the deliveries of byChloe, a vegan restaurant in NYC. I designed their chips bag, Apron, coloring book, freezer, ice-cream Cart, Water bottle design, etc.

The most important thing I have learned from this internship is the process of new branding projects. I got the chance to watch the kick-off meeting, participate in pitching and even see how the final photo shot was done for two projects. By interviewing Laureen and talking with the other designers, I learned how to she start this design studio. This internship was a great way for me to start figuring out what is like to work in a branding studio and I left with many new additions to my own portfolio.

Gretel

I had an amazing summer at Gretel, a design studio in New York City. As I prepare for a career in graphic design, I am dedicated to gaining practical experience to complement my academics. I had always hoped to immerse myself in a studio culture and collaborate with creative people from different disciplines. After the spring break, I found Gretel on imageofthestudio.com and looked through the works on their website. I loved the use of bold typography in their visual designs and their creative motion works. I emailed them immediately and inquired about summer internship opportunity.

The production coordinator emailed back within one week and asked me for an interview. I decided to visit their studio in NYC and meet them in person. I took the train on a Friday morning and made it to Union Square, where Gretel located. I met the coordinator and one of their designers, introduced some of my works on my portfolio website, and had a small studio tour. I got the offer next Tuesday. I knew that it would be a valuable opportunity for me, so I accepted the offer without hesitation. Gretel has a lot of experiences working for channels and medias like Viceland, Channel 5, and National Geography. Their work for Viceland wins top awards from the Clio Awards, D&AD Awards, ADC Awards, and TDC. My direct supervisor was the production coordination. She takes managerial responsibility in the studio and helped me fit in the working environment.

I became one of their design interns for three months, and worked on five different projects which were at different stages of production. I worked for a branding project and experimented with the font pairing, monogram design, and illustrations. I worked on the advertising project for The Daily, New York Time’s broadcast program, for over a month, finding and organizing tons of photography and video references. I read through articles about immigration, ISIS, North Korea, Trade War, and became familiar with names of NYT photographers. It was absolutely a great experience for me and was what I’m most proud of during my internship. I also worked on final files for a bakery shop they branded. I created printing files for coffee cups, takeaway bags, Tshirts, and tapes. I experienced what is it like to work in a creative studio in NYC, work on long-term projects, and work for big clients. I learned technical skill of building final files for packaging designs; I studied design and branding strategy from their projects; I also learned how to work with others efficiently. My intern experience has helped me clarified my career goals. I want to work in a medium size creative agency like Gretel, who does influencing and inspiring projects.

I’m so lucky to spent my three months at Gretel and met a bunch of amazing people. Thanks to the help from MICA career development and my internship supervisor, I had a memorable summer and a valuable experience.

Studio Rodrigo

I’m Juliette Wang, a rising senior Graphic Design student. For 2018’s summer, I was a Design Intern for Studio Rodrigo, a product design agency based in New York. They produce various work from products, marketing websites to branding; clients include Adobe, This American Life, Serial Podcast, Comcast, ABC News, xfinity, and more. Studio Rodrigo is most focused in helping companies identity and evaluate product opportunities, developing strategies, and designing and bringing new products and services to market. I became aware of Studio Rodrigo last summer so this summer I decided to apply for the internship. Hieu Tran, my professor and good friend, interned and worked at Studio Rodrigo last summer so he mentioned me to Rodrigo as they were looking for interns. I also met them in person at MICA Career Fair and after, I sent a carefully composed ‘cover letter’ email to Rodrigo with my resume and portfolio website. After a couple of days, I got an email back from the Creative Director for a call to meet more of the designers. I went through my projects, asked question and answered questions and they told me more about Studio Rodrigo. Then two weeks after, I got an email back about my offer and I accepted it a day after.

Depending on the various projects I worked on, my direct supervisor shifts depending on the Design Lead. But I worked closely with Jon Chonko where he lead my main project, Preferred Return and various different smaller projects. He is a senior designer and design director of Studio Rodrigo and gave me various tasks, projects and feedback. We also reported to Ritik, who manages the whole studio and reaches out to client directly and sits in meetings. For one of my main projects, Serial Season 3, I reported directly to Khoi Uong who was the creative director of Studio Rodrigo.

I worked on several projects in the three months that I was at Studio Rodrigo. The responsibilities and projects includes producing socials for TurboVote, designing various brand, web and products for Preferred Return, producing a banner and presentation PRX, redesigning the website and pages for Serial S3, designing and updating posters for 4 for 40 and creating concepts for Spell. The two main projects that I’ve worked and are most proud of is Serial Season 3 and Preferred Return, where a lot of my designs and concepts got approved and produced. Serial Season 3, I got to redesign all the different pages and various elements that is used on the website. For Preferred Return, I got to help produce their report, completely deliver their logo, brand styleguide and collateral, produce various of their web pages and helped out with elements of the product. I was proud of all the work I got to do and work on, especially those that are liked by the other designers, finalized and shown to the clients and sent into development.

The various skills that I’ve picked up includes technical skills such as compiling a deck for presentation, compiling a brand guideline, preparing final files to be sent out, as well as personal skills like thinking critically about the product and designing for functionality, talking to clients, listening for feedback to improve on work. I also learnt a lot about product design itself and how resizing it for screen works, the various screen resolutions, the specific spacing in pixels, and the rules and patterns that UI/UX is needed. I definitely learnt a lot about the process of producing a website and the little details we have to be aware of.

My biggest take-away from this internship is to experience various different companies, explore different jobs and have fun when I’m young. I also realize that I cant imagine myself not working digitally as I’m working so much on web and product and really enjoy it. An important thing I learnt was that I get excited about making products but I’m not sure about working in house but I’m excited to see what that would be like.

TimHaahs

My name is Eun Young (Esther) Ko, an upcoming Senior majoring in Architecture Design in Maryland Institute College of Arts. During the summer of 2018, I worked as intern for TimHaahs located in Pennsylvania, USA. TimHaahs is a multi-disciplined engineering and architectural design firm that provides planning design services to create parking and mixed used facilities. The company specializes in developing unique and effective parking strategies to create attractive, vibrant and sustainable communities.

As a student who is wishing to have as much experience in different fields in architecture, I started looking for architectural firms specializing in something totally different than the companies I had worked for before. Fortunately, I was able to watch a documentary about TimHaahs that mainly designed parking structure that I never thought of. For this reason, I decided to apply for TimHaahs internship during summer 2018. After doing some research and visiting the company’s website, I contacted the Human Resource team. After a couple of days, TimHaahs quickly gave a response asking to submit a resume and a portfolio. After exchanging emails and submitting the required works, I was told to come in the Pennsylvania office for an interview. Exactly after a week, I was accepted to work as an intern for 11 weeks.

While I worked as an intern, I was able to experience working in an architectural firm in the United States when I have only previously worked in South Korea. During the internship program that was a little over two months, I was able to work on more than 5 projects that were presented to the real clients that is also planned to be built in real life. As an undergrad student, it was a great opportunity to learn and experience working on varies projects in a short period of time. The company trained me on ways of thinking

of different design ideas for a parking structure and what realistic facts we should have in mind to make the design come true. Through the experience, I was able to know the traits of doing coordination of a project as a leader and now I feel confident on bringing people together and organizing a project.

I feel fortunate that I had another opportunity to work as an intern before senior year of college. I believe the summer before senior year is a very important period where I should be thinking more deeply about what I want to do in the future. The working experience successfully helped me to think more in depth and I plan to continuously think until the end the year. In MICA, I wish to finish the last year strong and create projects that talk about my architectural passion.