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Interview with Steve Roberts |
Home > Designer Interviews > Steve Roberts |
Editor Frank Scott (FS) from DesignPRWire has interviewed designer Steve Roberts (SR) for A’ Design Award and Competition. You can access the full profile of Steve Roberts by clicking here.
FS: Could you please tell us more about your art and design background? What made you become an artist/designer? Have you always wanted to be a designer?
SR: After working for a London design agency for a number of years, I was getting tired of the hectic schedule, which is when I thought it would be a good idea to specialise and ended up landing in app design. Since then I've been working with various start ups around the UK and national corporation like Nationwide and Gumtree. When I was a young boy, I painted small army figures and always had my head in a paint by numbers but I was quite into sports and wanted to be a p.e teacher but fortune had it that my school dropped physical education due to lack of popularity, so choose product design in its place and from there I haven’t looked back.
FS: Can you tell us more about your company / design studio?
SR: 7robots is the name of the company (Steven Roberts, minus the "t" in Steven, minus the second "r" in Roberts and change the "e" to an "o" and thats how the name came about). The only staff member is myself (and occasional contractor) busy designing and building beautiful digital products, brands, and experiences.
FS: What is "design" for you?
SR: Design is a tricky word. It means different things to different people. For myself, design is the whole thing. It's the way it looks, way it works, way it smells...it's the whole thing.
FS: What kinds of works do you like designing most?
SR: In terms of product design, I have to say I take more joy in visual design over user experience design. Mostly due to the reaction of the clients. Outside of the product sphere branding would top the list.
FS: What is your most favorite design, could you please tell more about it?
SR: An app I designed in my spare time called smalltalk. It provides 6 stimulating subjects each day (a inspirational quote, a fact, a joke, on this day, word of the day and tip of the day), which has organically grown to 40k+ users, showing me that users like and want to use the app without the influence by any marketing.
FS: What was the first thing you designed for a company?
SR: Illustrations for marmite that were featured in the “bumper book of marmite”.
FS: What is your favorite material / platform / technology?
SR: Digital, online, interactive.
FS: When do you feel the most creative?
SR: In the office surrounded by other creatives.
FS: Which aspects of a design do you focus more during designing?
SR: Always the "need" of the client, rather than the "want", and remembering if an aspect doesn’t enhance the user experience or the brand then it's not required.
FS: What kind of emotions do you feel when you design?
SR: That's a tough one as it depends how the project is going, it can range from frustration to elation.
FS: What kind of emotions do you feel when your designs are realized?
SR: If it's been a long time coming then a cool satisfaction.
FS: What makes a design successful?
SR: In short, people are using it, and hopefully making their life easier or better
FS: When judging a design as good or bad, which aspects do you consider first?
SR: Has it accomplished the brief.
FS: From your point of view, what are the responsibilities of a designer for society and environment?
SR: Making peoples lives easier and/or better
FS: How do you think the "design field" is evolving? What is the future of design?
SR: I can see user interfaces becoming more and more minimal, touch specific and voice activated. I can see there always be a place for branding and marketing.
FS: When was your last exhibition and where was it? And when do you want to hold your next exhibition?
SR: I entered a competition in 2013, to design a "beermat". My submission of "bearmat" got exhibited but I haven't held my own exhibition.
FS: Where does the design inspiration for your works come from? How do you feed your creativity? What are your sources of inspirations?
SR: Mostly online resources like dribbble, pinterest, medium or simply going for a walk to get some fresh air and reset.
FS: How would you describe your design style? What made you explore more this style and what are the main characteristics of your style? What's your approach to design?
SR: I wouldn’t class “clean” as i style but I’m a big fan of minimal, simple, clever products
FS: Where do you live? Do you feel the cultural heritage of your country affects your designs? What are the pros and cons during designing as a result of living in your country?
SR: Currently living in the green, green grass of Wales, Cardiff.
FS: How do you work with companies?
SR: It's is split quite evenly between companies wanting a body in-house with their team and one's that are happy for me to work remotely.
FS: What are your suggestions to companies for working with a designer? How can companies select a good designer?
SR: Listen and collaboration, make sure you build a relationship with the designer. No one knows more about your company than you do. Designers know their stuff, you know your stuff, put it together and that's a whole lot of stuff we know. But there are no short cuts. To pass all that knowledge along we need to talk. And talk. And talk and talk and talk. We need to be in the same space, we need to share stupid ideas before we get to the good ideas.
FS: Can you talk a little about your design process?
SR: The process starts with the proposal. Work with the client to understand their needs. It always beings with getting to know the client, then if we take a usual product design product for example... research, strategy, user experience, visual design, development, QA, analytics and testing.
FS: What are 5 of your favorite design items at home?
SR: Macbook pro, iPad pro, magic mouse, sketch pad and pencil
FS: Can you describe a day in your life?
SR: Wake at 5:30am, 6:00am gym class, home for a coffee and toast before walking to the office for 9:00am, where I like to stay till 5-5:30pm.
FS: Could you please share some pearls of wisdom for young designers? What are your suggestions to young, up and coming designers?
SR: Get your work out there, whether it's a website portfolio or uploading works to inspiration sites much as Dribbble or Behance. When designing a product, don’t be fixated on a single screen, people don’t think wow look at that one screen…
FS: From your perspective, what would you say are some positives and negatives of being a designer?
SR: It's great to get paid for something that you love to do but on the flip side, the work never stops, there is always something you can be designing, whether its for a client or simply promoting yourself.
FS: What is your "golden rule" in design?
SR: If its useful it’ll always be used.
FS: What skills are most important for a designer?
SR: Communication, problem solving, aesthetic talent.
FS: Which tools do you use during design? What is inside your toolbox? Such as software, application, hardware, books, sources of inspiration etc.?
SR: Adobe creative suite, Sketch, Invision
FS: Designing can sometimes be a really time consuming task, how do you manage your time?
SR: Routine, I try to keep to a 9-5 schedule.
FS: How long does it take to design an object from beginning to end?
SR: Couldn’t say an accurate time frame as all clients have different objectives and goals but broadly I would say longer than you'd think.
FS: What is the most frequently asked question to you, as a designer?
SR: Can you quickly knock-up something? shouldn’t take more than 5 minutes
FS: What was your most important job experience?
SR: I would have to say working in a London design agency. The fast pace and tight deadlines meant you had to learn and develop quickly or you had to get out of the way.
FS: Who are some of your clients?
SR: Nationwide, Gumtree, Marmite, NHS, Hodge bank, Paperclip, Dell EMC, Fling
FS: What type of design work do you enjoy the most and why?
SR: I enjoy all the work that I do but working with clients that are full of energy, enthusiasm and ambitious is the best
FS: What are your future plans? What is next for you?
SR: My future plans for now is to keep expanding my client base. I would love to start working with more clients outside of the UK.
FS: Do you work as a team, or do you develop your designs yourself?
SR: My work patterns range from working on my own (with obviously collaboration with client feedback), working with other contractors/agencies and working in-house with a client's team.
FS: How can people contact you?
SR: howdy@7robots.co.uk
FS: Thank you for providing us with this opportunity to interview you.
A’ Design Award and Competitions grants rights to press members and bloggers to use parts of this interview. This interview is provided as it is; DesignPRWire and A' Design Award and Competitions cannot be held responsible for the answers given by participating designers.
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