Do you want to enhance your creative skills? Do you feel stuck within your design specialty? Do you want apply your creative skills to a variety of projects? Maybe you should consider a Generalist Design approach.

At Nollie, we are here to demonstrate the transferable skills between the different types of design. We believe that by learning and respecting other design fields it builds your creative skills and gives you more opportunities to expand your work.

What is Generalist Design?

Generalist Design is a term that applies to designers who can work across multiple specialties and views their work in a holistic way. They aren’t stuck in one design field, but can apply their craft across different types of creative projects.

Nollie is here to promote Generalism in Design and encourage you to no longer stay in your lane. The goal of Nollie is to encourage you to look into other Design fields and apply those principles to your own, allowing you to adapt to opportunities and become versatile in your creativity. 

When I read about amazing designers, their work would cover all sorts of projects, why couldn’t I do that? Take Leonardo DaVinci or Charles Rennie Mackintosh, what was stopping me from building a body of work like theirs? Especially now that education and technology are leaps and bounds better than their day. 

How would I even start? Now I know how, and I want to share this with you. That is the mission of Nollie. We intend to become the common space where designers from all backgrounds can learn from different design disciplines, build new skills and enhance their creativity.

These skills have been broken down into 12 Categories, each with a corresponding design field, from which you can find resources and articles to help you build your skills. As you master each category, you’ll see how they correspond between the others. Your skills will cover both 2D and 3D elements of design.

Each category will be connected to a different month, so sign up to the newsletter to get regular updates!

1. The Past Masters – Famous Polymath Designers

They say “we are standing of the shoulders of giants” meaning we should respect and learn how our current design landscape was formed by the influences of the designers who came before us. If we are looking at designer who we could consider Jack-of-all-trades, who were they and what did they accomplish?

In our Past Masters series, we will look into famous Designers who had the skills to work within multiple fields within Design. Many of the famous designers in history would work across different fields. What can we learn from them?

Specialisation is a very new concept and before the industrial revolution the work of Designers used to be broad and wasn’t limited to one field. 

We will look into famous designers in history, checking out their work and figuring out what skills we can learn and use in a modern context.

What can we learn from the past?

2. Aesthetics – Graphic Design

Aesthetics is the visual language that is conveyed in your design work. It is the skills to make something look good. If you know the skills to make something good to loook at you can apply that to your other creative work. Many of the principles of aesthetics are contained within the field of Graphic Design and Photography. In this series we cover elements like Colour Theory, composition, choosing typography and an overall look into Graphic Design to know what makes something look good?

Graphic Design is one the easiest forms of Design to start with. You can begin learning the principles with just a pen and paper. You can begin almost immediately. There is a list of different software from Adobe to open source platforms that allow people to learn at any level. 

As you learn the principles of what makes something look good you can apply that to other design projects.

I’ll introduce some creative projects you can do to enhance your visual communication.

3. Form – Fashion Design

We will delve into designing around specific forms. In this case, we will be taking cues from the field of Fashion Design. We’ll be looking into how we can design around the human body to create visually appealing and functional designs that allow people to express themselves individually.

Fashion Design shares several areas of overlap with Graphic Design when it comes to designing clothing. You’ll share similar processes by creating 2D patterns, which when stitched together become an item of clothing. By developing your Fashion Design principles, you’ll be learning how to take from the page and the screen and turning it into a real tangible item, and your skills will go from 2D to 3D.

Fashion Design has to design around human measurements and we’ll look at how you can use this in your design work.

4. Quantity – Industrial Design

Designing different quantities of your design correlates with the principles found within Industrial Design. Industrial Design centres around the creation of products and equipment that can be used and interacted with.

Industrial Design is about creating products to be used by many. It will require manufacturing and distribution. You will need to learn how to create your designs to a specification, creating dimensions for your design that can be supplied to a manufacturer. 

In this section we’ll delve into building prototypes and creating 3D models and learning how users interact with your design.

5. Environment – Interior Design

Designing for your environment can be found within the realm of Interior Design. Interior Design is about creating spaces that function for the user and matches the visual identity of the people within the space.

We’ll look into designing spaces with a focus on creating accessible functional spaces that work for those contained within it. We’ll look into what makes a timeless interior and give you tools for developing your own space, like your home.

6. Atmosphere – Lighting Design

Creating an Atmosphere is a unique principle within design as it relates to how we feel when in a space or looking at an object. One of the easiest way to alter a space’s atmosphere is to change the light used within it.

In this series, we’ll delve into learning about how we can use light in our designs to change how people feel towards it. Light has an incredible impact on a person’s mood, and we’ll be delving into how you can use this to your advantage.

Learn how to create atmospheric lighting, using natural light from the sunshine, and alter the mood of any location or mood. You’ll have the understanding to add light as a new method of your design execution.

7. Time – Animation Design

Time is another principle of design which can be distilled in the field of Animation. Using your design skills, you can convey the progression of time to convey movement. Animation is a great asset in presenting your visual ideas and gains more attention from viewers than a simple image.

Animation is an amazing way to create a story within your work. It allows you to present your ideas effectively and can be a new outlet for your creativity.

8. Data – Product Design

For this principle we will be looking into how data can influence your design, and how data can be harnessed to create new work. This is highly related to the field of Product Design, which focuses on Websites and App Design, known as User Experience Design (UX). 

Here we’ll be looking at ways you can collect data about your users to inform your design decisions.

9. Possession – Jewellery Design

In this principle, we will be looking into what makes someone hold onto your design and add value the longer they have it. It becomes better with age.

No better field of Design creates this sentimentality than Jewellery Design. A piece of jewellery becomes a treasure for the owner and only adds deeper emotional significance over time. The finished object is designed to be enjoyed for years and passed down through the years. It may even add value. 

Learn how to create things that build this emotional relationship with the user.

10. Materials – Ceramics Design

Good design comes with an intimate knowledge of the materials you are using, the same way ingredients matter to a professional chef. No better design field has a better awareness of materials than Ceramic Design.

Ceramic Design can cover Glass Design and Ceramic products. With ceramics, there is an deeper understanding of the materials being used and how it will affect the final outcome of the design.

In this we’ll look into how you can learn your materials and know how to use them in a way that creates the expected result.

11. Interaction – Game and VR Design

As humans, we crave interaction and we can develop that within our design work. We will be looking at Interactive design through the lens of Games and VR Design.

Being immersed in your design allows people to build a bigger connection with it.

12. Future – Sustainable Design and Artificial Intelligence

In this section we’ll delve into the future of Design. We’ll look at the current landscape and give you tools to navigate the design industry in the future.

We’ll show you how you can create a career for yourself as a Designer, finding job opportunities, dealing with clients and knowing the business side of things.

We’ll also be looking into topics surrounding how design work will be done in the future with advancements in AI, climate change and building a sustainable future where our designs don’t end up destroying the planet.

Why be a Generalist Designer?

Being a Generalist Designer means that you have built a variety of creative skills that allows you to transition easily between different types of creative projects.

It will grow your understanding of your creative process and give you a better level of understanding when your collaborating.

Being a specialist in one design field comes a lot from the industrial revolution. Specialism is another form of industrialisation. It makes you really good at one element of design, which is perfect for employers who want one person to do one thing well. Teaching is also easier, as you only have to focus on one creative discipline.

But as a creative person, you should allow yourself to be inspired by everything. By learning the multiple principles of Design, you’ll know how these disciplines interact and bring much more creative energy and wisdom to your work.