Alexa Lupul — Dossier designer, split board adventurer, and team collaborator — talks about creativity, finding inspiration and creating intention.
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What does a day in the life of a designer at Dossier generally look like?
It can change day-to-day depending on the speed of the studio. Some days it’s coming in and checking email, finding out what’s on and working through a bunch of creative problems. When it’s busy, it’s about getting straight into some work. Essentially it’s a lot of project juggling, working with other departments to get all the right information and checking in with our Strategy and Production teams. It’s really about collaboration and working together to create alignment for success. My portion of a project is to synthesise all the information and make something with creative intent.
I really love helping passionate people that have a product or idea visualize their dreams, and be a part of creating something tangible for them.
What do you love the most about your job?
I have always really liked being in design in general — working with lots of different clients from completely different industries and getting a chance to learn about them. It means that tomorrow there could be anything or anyone that I can learn from. It gives you a huge range of different visual styles to work with, so that you don’t pigeonhole yourself.
And getting to help people — especially smaller businesses. I really love helping passionate people that have a product or idea visualize their dreams, and be a part of creating something tangible for them.
Where do you find inspiration?
I spend a lot of my spare time doing outdoorsy things. Split boarding and snowboarding in the winter. Summer is about escaping the city — visiting friends who live in cute little towns around BC.
My go-to places for creative and work inspiration are old print designs — I love packaging and old signage. I love going into little old antique stores and junk shops, looking at all the old packaging and typographic styling. In Vancouver, I also love the thriving restaurant industry. Its great keeping an eye on the companies who do strong branding for the restaurants and cafes.
Rather then having one huge thing to work towards, I break it down into small incremental changes. I try not to make a mountain out of a molehill.
What have you learned that you wish you had known at the start of your career?
To have intention — because I’m really good at thinking about the things I want to do but not holding myself accountable. Rather then having one huge thing to work towards, I break it down into small incremental changes. I try not to make a mountain out of a molehill. It’s amazing how much of a difference it can make, having intent and follow-through.
As told to Anthony Hore for Dossier. Transcript edited and condensed for clarity.
Photography by Cherihan Hassun.