Gingerbred

© Sarah Ward 2010

Gingerbred is the lovely blog of Sarah a freelance creative designer and illustrator based in the U.K.

Eagle eyed followers make recognise the friendly croc above as a runner up in our recent Fun male character competition.

Sarah has a delightful blog featuring her wonderfully happy and quirky characters and reflections on everyday life. 

University/ College: UCE Birmingham

Course: Visual Communication (specialising in Graphic Design)

Current Occupation:  Freelance designer & illustrator

What three to five words would you use to describe your work?

Fun, cute, simple – I like to make people smile and giggle!

What inspires you?

I really do find inspiration from everything around me – from a piece of toast to a piece of artwork! I get a lot of inspiration from everyday life, watching and listening to the things around me. I do love to work whilst listening to music too, so my iPod must be inspiring to me!

 

What was your first job?  When/how did you know you wanted a career in art?

My first job after finishing my degree was at Santoro Graphics, it wasn’t as a designer though as you might expect – I was a PA. My first full time design job was at Hallmark cards.

From a young age I loved to draw (you could always find me with a set of coloured pencils or wax crayons!), so from then on I’ve always known I wanted to follow the ‘art route’ with my studies. I’ve not always know which direction to take as I love all areas of art and design, I think it was my job at Hallmark cards which made me realise ‘this direction is right for me’.

 

Design books/blogs you can’t live without

Ooo this is tough as there are so many! (too many to list!) – take a peek at the list of blogs I follow on my blog, there’s some extremely talented people out there. One of the main ones has to be print & pattern – both the blog and the book! A lot of books I draw inspiration from are children’s books; some of my favourites have to be Oliver Jeffers.

 

What mediums do you work with?

My work takes two directions – initial pencil sketches and then working them up and adding texture on the Mac, or pure vector illustrations drawn straight onto the Mac. When I have spare time I do love to paint too – for this I mainly use acrylics.

What’s next?

To continue with my design and illustration work and building up a variety of freelance clients. I would love to one day illustrate a book so I’ll continue to follow this dream.