Thursday, December 13, 2012

Life as a Graphic Designer in Tokyo

Here I am, leaving my 11 and a half years of life in Europe (London and Amsterdam) behind, I am now living in Tokyo. Despite being Japanese, this is my first time living in Tokyo, and I am loving it!


I currently work at a Japanese design company called Concent (it means 'an electronic plug' in Japanese), that specializes in editorial and web design. The strength of the company (it feels a bit too big to call it a studio) is design dealing with information. Although I see that it is trying to expand itself towards the direction of experience design and design thinking, and studios that approach design in such a direction is indeed rather rare here in Japan, I've been pretty darn lucky.

Its facebook company information reads this:
Mission
Designing Communication Architecture
つたわるしくみのデザイン

Company Overview
Concent, Inc. is a premiere design firm based in Tokyo. We design projects to deliver holistic brand and website experience to users; benefits to our clients, employing Human Centered Design process.
Concent, Inc. belongs to AZ holdings which has 2 unique publishers called BNN, Inc. and Filmart-sha; and flower shop "Kusakanmuri". AZ holdings is also running multipurpose
creative space "amu" in Tokyo and a branch office in Paris.

I've been fortunate to be surrounded by very kind colleagues, which makes everyday a learning experience without bad tension or stress.

My name is being credited under 'design and creation' sections of two of the newly published books in Japan. Even though my name being credited is more out of the generosity from the people in the office as my involvement wasn't so large, it still marks the start of my graphic design career here in Japan.



Tokyo is a very creative city, filled with good exhibitions, gigs, theatre, and design. Indie scene is also strong and there are creative individuals doing interesting things. I've been busy seeing my friends' theatre performance, theatre design, comedies, exhibitions etc and standards are, to my surprise, rather high.

The problem is it's so hard to resist all these temptations that the city has to offer. We know well that creative practice or learning anything often requires a time alone with yourself being focused.




And, it seems like I will be presenting at Pecha Kucha Night Tokyo next Wednesday in Roppongi! Making my official debut as a Pecha Kucha speaker! I am planning to do my presentation in English. Come join the festivity.
As you know, Pecha Kucha is a 20 images x 20 seconds presentation format, and Pecha Kucha Night brings together creative people of different fields.
Find more info on the facebook event page here.



11年半のヨーロッパでの生活に、軽やかに(とか言いつつ、実際は12時間のフライト中、映画を1本も観ずにひたすら泣き続けながら)別れを告げ、初の東京都民としてのニューライフをスタートしました。
ですが、選挙に行くには、現在の住所に3ヶ月以上住んでいないといけないようで、選挙にいけなくて残念です。「この政党の全ての政策・方針に賛成!」という政党はない中、1票を入れるとしたら、どこに入れるか?という問題は、自分のなかで、どの分野を重んじているかという問いであるということに気付き、選挙について考えるのはなかなか面白いです。個人的には、なんだかんだTPPかな。


現在は、新卒採用が決まっているデザイン会社で、アルバイトとして働いています。今までデザインのインターンも何件かしてきたけれど、この会社の先輩が一番教えるのが丁寧。人が優しくてよかった!


そんなこんなで、来週水曜日、Pecha Kuchaナイト東京で、プレゼンテーションします。プレゼンターとしてのデビューを飾ります@六本木スーパーデラックス。
ぺちゃくちゃナイトとは、現在世界586カ国で行われている、20スライド×1枚20秒のプレゼン形式で、クリエイティブ系の人たちの交流会も兼ねているイベント。ロンドンに住んでいるときから、面白そうなイベントは聴きにいったりしていたので、今回、声がかかって光栄な限り。
ちなみに私は、英語での参戦予定ですが、プレゼンターは英語と日本語どっちもいると思います。英語の勉強も出来て、2度お得かも?お暇でしたら是非。イベント詳細はfacebook イベントページにて。