A Summer Internship at Beyond Design
I recently graduated in May from The University of Kansas with my BFA in Design. I chose to pursue an internship with Beyond Design because I am very interested in the type of product design and design strategy they do here. Eventually, I would like to work in a similar consultancy environment. I find the fast paced nature of the workload to be a great building block on the design skill set you gain in school.
When I was growing up in Kansas, I was highly influenced by my dad who was a very do-it-yourself type of person. He takes an approach to life where he is always going to try to solve a problem himself before ever thinking to ask for help. The more we worked together I began to appreciate and start to understand the gratification he gets from finding solutions to complex problems. For me, the way he approaches life is much of what Industrial Design is at its core and I wanted my career to be filled with the same gratification.
I first learned about Industrial Design when I was around nine years old. My mom’s brother is an Industrial Designer and at the time he was designing school lunch boxes for Arctic Zone. For Christmas, he sent us a package full of lunch boxes he had designed as a present for my brother and me. The key feature of these lunch boxes was a hard plastic storage container on the bottom of the bag that was separate from the main storage pocket. You could then zip open the bottom to store your sandwich of choice without worrying about it getting smashed among the other items on the way to school. As a nine year old, this change in my lunch box game was nothing short of groundbreaking innovation. I was fascinated how such a simple change could add such delight to my lunchtime experience. As I got older, I never forgot this moment because it was the first time a product made me smile.
I think as designers we see inspiration in the little things. It is the small nuisances in our everyday lives that are often over looked that I find inspiring. I find myself noticing considerations or small details in nature, people, architecture, and automotive designs that open my eyes to a new way of looking at an idea.
This summer in Chicago I am most excited to explore and attend the some of the art and music festivals. I play a lot of music in my free time so to be in such a culturally rich city full of live music is a real treat for me.
We are excited to have John on our team this summer!
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