Interviewing Creative Folk / Beci Orpin
So insanely happy to have Beci Orpin on the blog today. A top player in the Australian design world, Beci’s diverse creative career spans 20+ years with a distinct, clean style brought to life by textures, colours, and patterns and a unique cross over of craft, design and illustration. No stranger to murals, books, hosting workshops, and appearing in gallery exhibitions, you’ll spot her work gracing clothing, packaging, magazines, her husband’s food trucks, and even a piano (in partnership with Pixar and Disney). Beci kills the commercial arena (her CV is packed with amazing clients – making any designer green with envy!) but she also manages to find time for personal work and exploration. If you head to her website (a refreshing breath from the cookie-cutter world of website design) you’ll be transported into her world of fun. This ‘step outside but play by the rules’ approach (through a consistent practice and beautiful design) is something I absolutely admire in Beci. She balances a lovely line between filling briefs and stamping her own voice upon everything she touches.
Thanks, Beci for being on the blog today! You’re a legend!
Bush Craft for Lunch Lady Magazine – Image Source
1/Your work shows lovely peeks of nostalgia (shout out to your iso craft on insta!), I’m often reminded of a reimagined (better!) woman’s day craft book, is this in my head, or is it a product of growing up as an artsy kid in Australia?
Aw that’s so kind! Nostalgia is an ongoing theme for sure. My upbringing was quite alternative, my mum didn’t let us watch much TV and I was always playing outside or painting or drawing, plus lots of books and reading. My dad was also a builder and made his own stuff on the weekends. So not necessarily an ‘artsy’ upbringing, definitely one where I was encouraged to use my hands and creative thinking.
Portrait of Beci – Image Source
2/ Do you plan/contemplate the direction of your career in advance or has it developed organically over time?
I would say definitely the organic route, but I did have ideas of clients I wanted to work for or the type of work I wanted to make, so those concepts lead my direction.
3/ Have you found an ease with jumping between digital & more traditional ways of working?
Both are important to me, but I find when I’m doing a lot of one method of working, I crave the other. More and more I’m combining both in projects, which actually feels the best.
Sketchbook Collage – The Social Studio – Image Source
4/ Being a human is complex, how do you continually show up and make beautiful things, especially in lockdown times?
Ah that is such a hard question, especially as I sit here on a Monday morning in week 30-something of lockdown for Melbourne, having very little motivation to do anything (I find mondays are by far hardest!). Motivation comes from the most basic of needs, like having to finish jobs to provide income for my family! But also my work can be all encompassing, and can transport my brain to another place, which is very handy during times like these! I also crave the dopamine of ticking things off my list, achieving that is motivating too. But these past few weeks have been very hard TBH!
5/ Are you ever dissatisfied with a piece of work and if so, how do you stop it from crushing you?
I generally try not to let work go out that I am not happy with, but it does happen, especially when you work under a client’s direction, as you are trying to satisfy their needs and tastes, which can be different to yours. If this does happen I just keep making more work, and replace that crushing feeling with the satisfaction of making newer, better work. But also the satisfaction of making a client happy, regardless of if you like the outcome or not, can be a good feeling too.
Broadsheet (Disney and Pixar) – Image Source
6/ Does your creativity come from a higher place/genetics/past life or is it a matter of staying curious about the world and absorbing inspiration?
I think it’s a combination of everything. You need to have a heightened awareness, and you also need to do things which give you inspiration. I always say experiences give the best inspiration – travel, eating delicious meal, seeing a great show etc. Obviously during lockdown its pretty hard to get these external stimulations, but you can still find inspiration from simple every day things. It’s definitely tricky though.
7) Percent of time spent running your business to actually being creative and making?
My business is pretty simple, it’s just me and some part time helpers when I need them. I’ve done this intentionally – there was a time when my studio had 3-4 employees and could have grown it further from there, but I didn’t love how much time I spent managing staff instead of doing the actual work (it’s the work i love, not being a boss or building a big company!), so I started to manage the work differently and make things simplier, so I could go back to doing most of the hands on stuff again. This also meant I don’t have to spend that much time actually running the business. I much prefer it that way. Plus I have a great book keeper who keeps everything in check, and my partner Raph does some of the more businessy things too. Lots of my jobs are also managed by agencies Jacky Winter and GAS in Japan, where they do most of the biz stuff. So i’d say percentage wise pretty small – maybe just 10%?!
Pet Rocks for Lunch Lady – Image Source
8/ Any current obsessions that you’re eager to translate into work?
I’m constantly making random lists in my sketchbooks of things which are inspiring me, and which could trickle down into my work some way, someday. The most recent list was :
Curly fonts / Zeedijik playground 1955 / Dingyun Zhang / fox gloves & hollyhocks / Apple bus stop / mushrooms (forever) / daisy / florals on sportswear / La Bambole sofa / spring weather / nanamica & northface collab / Ellen Virgona
Where to find & follow Beci
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