With a BFA from University of Victoria, independent designer Henry Slaughter (IDEA Grad 2013) is immersed in every aspect of the creative process — from branding to photography to web design (Part 1)
We recently caught up with independent designer Henry Slaughter (IDEA Grad 2013), for a grad spotlight on life after graduating from IDEA School of Design. Portrait of Henry (shown above) by Lauren Zbarsky.
“I remember dreading the idea of more school after four years at UVic but as I got closer and closer to “graphic design” I was fascinated and excited to create a foundation for myself and build a proper skillset.”
Check out Part 1 of 2 of this grad spotlight!
Edelson branding and web design by Henry Slaughter (IDEA Grad 2013) with Course Studio (Completion: 2021)
What type of projects are you currently working on?
I’m currently managing a handful of branding and web design projects of various sizes and client types. As an independent, self-employed designer, I like to approach my work intake like a stock portfolio: varied, but intentional. I spend a little over half my week working directly with private clients I manage myself and spend the other half working for a small agency called Course Studio and their clients (essentially an ongoing freelance contract, without a contract) leading all their international client branding and web projects.
The “variety” above is for a few reasons: each project/client carries different kinds of pressure and stress, pay structures, creative output, and project management.
My current, personal client projects are an ice cream packaging for a company on Salt Spring called Mavericks, branding for a Canadian geology and minerals company called Koulou, branding for a new Canadian cannabis company called Next Friday, naming, branding, and web design for an American wealth management company (yet to be named), ongoing design for kitchen renovations company called Swede in Victoria and packaging for a Canadian skincare company called Forah.
Under Course Studio’s clients, we are rebranding and redesigning the website for Montreal-based Market Gardener Institute, branding and web design for American company Model Meetings, and completely redesigning the Course Studio agency website to better introduce its positioning and offering.
Sports Icon branding and web design by Henry Slaughter (IDEA Grad 2013) with Course Studio (Completion: 2021)
What does Course Studio offer clients and what are the challenges you face and rewards you earn doing branding and design for their clients, as opposed to your own?
Course Studio offers teachers, creators, and thinkers to get their course material, content, or ideas online to sell to anyone through videos, digital booklets, and beyond. Their clients typically have an idea or a skillset and want to be able to package their content to sell to anyone, anywhere in the world. Consider it like the “masterclass” of a particular item. If Gordon Ramsey wanted his own brand and website, he would (and should) come to Course Studio to launch his own curriculum. We build all our bespoke websites on WordPress, with course curriculum on Thinkific, and get their online community on Circle.
Course Studio is a very young company (1-year-old) and approached me in the fall to brand their very first client, Edelson, based in New York. The client’s son, Sam Edelson, is the Director of Product Management at Airbnb, and brought along his co-worker, Farzad Sharif, head of Product Marketing, to work client-side on the project.
As an independent who manages, designs, writes, and produces the bulk of my clients’ work, it was great to feel the “team” aspect and the beginning of a great working partnership between myself and Course Studio.
A huge advantage for me with Course Studio is having access to their resources like project management, informal and impromptu opinions, and having the opportunity to meet and work with international clients. I’m now connected to Sam and Farzad who saw my level of work on the Edelson brand/website project and may recommend me in the future.
One of the challenges has been working at the fastest level possible to be able to juggle 3 or 4 branding and web design projects simultaneously. I branded, wrote copy, and designed the new website for Pareto Labs in just under 5 weeks. Development went on for another 5 weeks, but I was proud to be able to turn that around so quickly without sacrificing the level of work I expect from myself.
Sports Icon branding and web design by Henry Slaughter (IDEA Grad 2013) with Course Studio (Completion: 2021)
“After graduating from the University of Victoria’s Fine Arts Degree program in 2010 and Capilano University’s IDEA School of Design program in 2013, Henry spent two years in Sydney Australia designing at multiple agencies before moving home to Vancouver. Since then he’s worked with global lifestyle brands like lululemon, Reigning Champ, and Bailey Nelson, and developed countless local brands. His experience in-house and agency-side have immersed him in every aspect of the creative process-from branding to photography to web design.”
Describe your career journey since graduating from IDEA School of Design at Capilano University
I left IDEA School of Design thinking that work will be easy, it will land in my lap, others would be lucky to have me, and design skill development will work itself out (without many speedbumps). Fortunately, I was hungry, and I knew I had the potential to earn a living from design if I focused and worked hard. I had built up a big network around the lower mainland after four years at UVIC, so I knew I could leverage my connections to get active in design through one-off projects, internships, and jobs.
I was also fortunate to meet Cesar Bañares at the IDEA Grad Show 2013 who offered me a job that spring at the now-defunct agency, Make Creative, next to the Main Street Brewery on 7th Ave. It was the perfect first job: huge space with a ping pong table, working on lengthy print booklets for UBC, including their Viewbook – the 60-pager sent to all the high schools for recruitment. I was challenged almost immediately by the nuances of the Adobe suite, producing crafted work within timelines, and finding ways to explore and evolve the design style (of these booklets) from previous years.
As hard and as long as the days were, looking back I’m just so lucky to have been given that opportunity. Varied, long-form, print design doesn’t come around very often, especially with a small group of individuals that are keen to take ping pong breaks and go have brewery beers after work (thanks Sarah Tesla!). The good times lasted about a year and a half until I was let go the following fall. The agency itself began to disassemble, too, which was unfortunate to see, and no longer exists today.
Smoking Gun Bagels Smoking Gun branding by Henry Slaughter (IDEA Grad 2013) (Completion: 2016)
Henry with Smoking Gun clients (Date: 2015)
Australia, New Zealand, and Bali
Following my tenure at Make, I jumped on a plane to Sydney with a one-way ticket and a working Visa. I knew I needed a challenge – and no, not an InDesign Paragraph Styles challenge. A real challenge of spending time learning about myself, building up a new network, and designing for different jobs and clients.
Australia’s work culture is centred around freelance and freelance recruitment. It worked in my favour as I bounced around different studios, met different people, and worked as a junior designer. This is when I got an opportunity to brand a new café and bagelry (Montreal-style) called Smoking Gun Bagels. I couldn’t believe I was presented with the chance to brand something of this scale and importance since coffee culture is paramount in their cities and culture.
I spent weeks and months crafting design concepts and presentation decks before moving into production. Looking back I am in disbelief I was given that much time to go through each of those phases. However, I hadn’t built my own branding process, and branding was all very new to me. After all the fumbling I managed to produce a wordmark and brand toolkit I’m still very proud of that still exist today.
Lululemon campaign poster design by Henry Slaughter (IDEA Grad 2013) (Completion: 2018)
Lululemon Athletica
After one and a half years of traveling and working around Australia’s east coast, parts of New Zealand, and Bali, I came home and started freelancing at lululemon in Vancouver. It taught me how to work hard and within a large group of creatives – I was green to the (slightly) corporate culture. It also helped build my network and pay my bills.
“I’ll never forget making those first invoices — I could hardly believe it.”
I managed to negotiate $50/h of full-time work as someone with three years of varied experience, which taught me about valuing myself better and standing up for what I believed the quality of my work was. It was a turning point in my career and gave me confidence when asking for more. I’ll never forget making those first invoices — I could hardly believe it.
Freelance
Since lululemon I’ve consistently challenged myself by leaning further into independence (or “freelance”), taking on personal clients, building processes (internally and externally), incorporating as a business, quoting on various projects, and learning new design techniques, typefaces, software and more.
My freelance roles since 2017 included Monday Creative (in Vancouver) whose Art Director is Ryan Romero (IDEA Grad 2008), leading graphic design within marketing and product for Sitka (in Victoria), and branding and design for Atomic (in San Francisco).
“I believed it was always good practice to put myself in front of clients that needed a variety of unexpected tasks and grow from different challenges that didn’t place the most importance on high-end design craft.”
Between these intermittent roles, I consistently said yes to (almost) all clients that reached out for branding creation and support, like Honest Camper, Paulie’s Barbershop, Bailey Nelson, People Footwear, Tantalus Labs, Swede, Bear’s Blooms, Laundry Day, and more. However, there’s also a handful of clients that fly under the radar that don’t need flashy, fun work, which brings me back to my point about variety in our work schedule.
Behind portfolio-worthy work on Instagram, there’s an unsexy project that requires building PowerPoint slide decks for a corporate client, or similar. Although I’m starting to move away from this type of thing, I believed it was always good practice to put myself in front of clients that needed a variety of unexpected tasks and grow from different challenges that didn’t place the most importance on high-end design craft.
sitka (before it became “ecologyst”) design for campaign and products by Henry Slaughter (Completion: 2018)
Why did you choose to go to IDEA School of Design after graduating from the University of Victoria’s Fine Arts Degree program in 2010?
A few forces led me to Capilano University’s IDEA School of Design. During my Fine Arts Degree, I was becoming increasingly interested in digital art and poster design while finding myself frustrated with the software. My friend Tori mentioned that her brother, Tyler Quarles, was in his 1st year at IDEA School of Design and I should check it out. I soon found myself in North Vancouver walking into the classroom to meet Kif Holland and sit beside TQ for one of the classes.
I remember dreading the idea of more school after four years at UVic but as I got closer and closer to “graphic design” I was fascinated and excited to create a foundation for myself and build a proper skillset. UVic was very conceptual, and varied in the mediums – I left with a BFA but no applicable skill unless I wanted to sell prints or paintings, which I wasn’t prepared to do.
I also never had enough space or time to get messy and create large pieces of art. Rather, I found great joy after buying a used Macbook Pro and installing the Adobe Suite to edit and collage photos, attempting typographic logos, or even exploring the system fonts while making Facebook photo album covers.
As I was applying to IDEA School of Design, I landed a job with Sitka, in Victoria, as the assistant men’s designer, doing clothing design and graphics for clothes. Back then, it was a dream job – I was earning $3,000/month to design mens’ clothing collections and build tech-packs for manufacturers while learning more about the software and design process.
September approached and I had to kiss the paychecks goodbye. I knew IDEA School of Design would build an unrivalled design education and foundation for me to pursue everything within the world of graphic design, whatever that turned out to be.
Did you network much during school?
I was super fortunate to get offered a summer internship with MEC’s in-house creative dept during the summer before 3rd year using my Sitka graphics and other scrappy portfolio pieces. I just kept building off of anything I had recently created, and always built a nicely designed PDF with whichever typeface was cool at the time. I always put my best foot forward and kept an active website or blog with simple designs and concepts.
During 3rd year, we were tasked with teaming up with an agency in town to do our grad projects. With a fascination for retail, I was interested in being involved with the small group at wings+horns/Reigning Champ – a popular Vancouver clothing manufacturer that produced high-quality clothes. I knew there must be an opportunity for a graphic designer to support their communication and marketing touchpoints given the size of their operation.
“I remember having absolutely no idea what I was doing: fumbling through multiple print spreads under my own direction for the first time.”
I spent the winter going back and forth from Cap U to the wings office creating email newsletters, improving their eCommerce experience, doing production design for print pieces, all the while working on and creating their brand book which included their origin story and guidelines. I remember having absolutely no idea what I was doing: fumbling through multiple print spreads under my own direction for the first time. The final solution was super simple and minimal, which worked out and aligned with their aesthetic, fortunately, and served as a great grad project.
Typewolf website feature of Henry Slaughter’s website (date: January 2020)
Awards & Recognition
I’ve won one award almost 10 years ago - It was the GDC National Scholarship Award in 2012 for a project I created in 2nd year all about Nike Jordan shoes and their legacy. I actually traced all the logos, found original images and stories, and compiled them across large-scale panels, to be used for a mock event. They gave me and two others students $1000 each towards our tuition, which was very generous and appreciated.
See also: 3 IDEA students win GDC National Scholarships
Another proud moment was being featured on Typewolf in 2020 after I launched my new website. Typewolf is a website I revere for its experimental, contemporary, and typographic focus. That was nice to wake up and see.
Alexis Young and Henry on Halloween 2012, and Henry, Alex Bakker, and Graham Handford at Alex’s 2014 Grad Show booth.
What are your memories and highlights from IDEA School of Design and have you stayed in touch with your cohort or instructors?
I’ll always remember the springtime – sitting on the grass in the sun, knowing we’ve managed to get through the school year and all the challenges it brought with it. By this time in the year, we’re burnt out, but we’ve got so much momentum to wrap up the projects and polish them for portfolios.
I’ve kept in touch with a handful of staff and students from different grad years. I just exchanged a few texts with Alexis Young (IDEA Grad 2013) the other day when she reminded me we both won GDC awards, ironically! I also exchange texts and questions with Alex Bakker (IDEA Grad 2014) and Mustaali Raj (IDEA Grad 2014).
Alex is an incredible designer at Rethink and Mustaali needs no introduction. Mustaali contributed beautiful brand concepts for a couple of projects of mine in the last few years and has a very keen conceptual approach to design.
I also keep up with John Lau infrequently when I want to get his opinion and new hardware or software or find out what his latest favourite pizza shop is. I miss my grad class though — we had such a good group. The collective humour and entertainment were fantastic.
A lot of tools have changed since you were in school. Please describe your process and what’s in your design toolkit these days? What new tools have you learned since graduating?
Since graduating, I’ve learned to use Sketch (web design), FontBase (for all the people who were on FontExplorer), Figma (all web-related and collaborative projects), Zoom, Notion (project management and shared note-taking), Google Docs (why use MS Word?), Google Slides (much friendlier and cheaper than Powerpoint), Squarespace and Wix (for the budget-conscious clients) and Shopify. I’ve also continually relearned how to use Instagram to promote my work and services better, from a business standpoint.
My process has also continuously evolved to become as streamlined as possible. Besides the software tools I previously mentioned, I like to regularly visit different design websites like The Brand Identity for inspiration and general awareness, which I would consider to be a tool or resource.
So much of my process involves understanding what else is being made or experimented with so that I know how I can push myself and my own boundaries. Some of it is stealing ideas and building on them, but some of it is also about educating yourself and getting out of your comfort zone.
After years of practice, I’ve built up a mental group of design solutions I can draw on for any project, so I’ll catch myself when I know I can do better. This usually begins by taking inventory of the world of design and branding.
What’s in your communications toolkit these days and have tools changed much during the pandemic? How has your work life changed during the pandemic?
My work-life changed, most noticeably, by limiting the ways we used to celebrate and reward the completion of projects or positive moments, like going for a coffee, beer, or a meal — I miss that shared, jubilant connection.
“The silver lining through the pandemic’s interruption was that it completely relieved the pressure I continuously faced when I set up Zoom meetings in the months and years prior to 2020.”
Fortunately, I have always made it a priority to set up a desk and chair at home, so there wasn’t any major disruption in access to a decent desk and home office. The silver lining through the pandemic’s interruption was that it completely relieved the pressure I continuously faced when I set up Zoom meetings in the months and years prior to 2020.
Communication is shared through email and Slack, with a bit of iMessage for the special ones. I can’t believe how well Slack has revolutionized informal, yet helpful, communication. It’s the modern-day MSN Messenger.
Coming up in Part 2 of our interview
In Part 2 of our interview find out about Henry’s private Slack channel where he works with a writer, web developer and fills gaps with other talent including Max Littledale (IDEA Grad 2018), Nicole Shewchuk (IDEA Grad 2020), and Ata Ojani (IDEA Grad 2020).
For more on Henry follow him on Instagram @henryslaughter and visit henryslaughter.ca.
