Company Background
Grace McGowan is the owner of GMMG Designs Studio who specialises in origami paper craft and floristry and for over the past two years a main exhibitor at local weddings and craft fairs creating their bespoke and original paper floristry.
GMMG have identified a niche in the market for functional self-assembly home accessories and giftware designs creating unique and cost effective to meet this market need.
Challenge
Grace is looking to expand her product offering in the form of functional self-assembly home accessories and giftware, however is prevented from doing so due to lack of graphic design skills needed to develop these bespoke crafts on a larger scale.
Solution
In order to overcome this skill deficit, Grace contacted the North West Regional College (NWRC) who were able to support her through the Innovate US programme, funded by Department for the Economy (DfE), which equated to 30 hours of training support from Aaron McKeever, NWRC Creative and Digital media Consultant to realise this new product.
Aaron prepared a detailed training plan to upskill Grace in areas of digital design and pattern mapping, using a variety of file formats and conversion recommendations specific to the product Grace wished to create.
The upskilling in various graphic design and CAD software was tailored so enable Grace develop the skills not only to create the product but to build confidence and technical skill to replicate her artworks digitally for transfer onto these new flat-packed, self-assembly giftware for future designs.
Impact
On completion of the project, Grace was successfully upskilled creating custom-made swatches, unique to GMMG’s product line and in a position to rollout for mass distribution. Grace’s bespoke artworks and patterns have an all-encompassing solution for retail purposes, artistically designed in order to reach a wide customer base but also add personalized touch to the product.
Undertaking the intricate upskilling in the area of digital graphical and CAD design solutions, Grace is able to replicate this to add to her new premium accessories and giftware product, which she expects to launch in autumn 2017.
