Studio Tuesday #2 Sophie Honeybelle

Hello, hello!

Today we are spending Studio Tuesday with Sophie Honeybelle who is based in Buckinghamshire, England.

As Sophie explains in her Q&A below, she started out using Adobe CS for jewellery design and this interest is evident in her work. She designs some really sophisticated, ornate looking motifs reminiscent of pieces of jewellery. Despite only taking ABSPD in 2012 Sophie has already established an unmistakable style of her own utilising a limited palette and layered geometric motifs. It's no wonder she recently secured a licensing deal with Wraptious, a new company who sell cards and gift wrap. Some of the designs featured today would make fantastic wallpaper or high-end toiletry packaging.

Q&A with Sophie Honeybelle - Honeybelle Surface Pattern Design

Where and how did you start your surface pattern design journey?

I was living in York in 2007 when I got my first copy of Adobe CS2. I got it originally to help me design jewellery and my business logo, but I soon started to experiment with making patterns.

I immediately loved playing around with shapes and colours and decided to look into how to do this kind of creative work as a career. My online research didn’t yield much in the way of information at that time and I was focused on setting myself up as a self-employed jewellery designer/maker, so didn’t pursue the idea any further.

By the end of 2012 I was finding it more fun to design patterns for my jewellery than make the jewellery itself so looked into a career in surface pattern design again. This time round there was a lot more information and I soon found The Art and Business of Surface Pattern design e-course. I approached someone who’d just taken the course and she raved about it and so I joined and it’s turned out to be one of the best career decisions I’ve made in years.

How do you approach a project/piece of work or collection?

Depends what it is and what it’s for.

If it’s a personal project – such as renewing my website – I plan everything on paper and write lists of things to do. I like to be really organised and so have to write it all down and plot the stages that will get me to the final result.

My approach for my own collections and designs is quite loose. If I already have an idea, I’ll just get on Abobe Illustrator and have a play and see what comes out. I like to be experimental and approach my own collections with a sense of freedom. If I try to direct it too much, it just doesn’t seem to flow as well. If I don’t have any particularly strong ideas I might doodle in my sketchbook for a bit and see what recurring shapes come out. If I have no inspiration whatsoever and I’m a bit blocked, I might go to London and have a wander around. I like looking at the architecture and going to stores to see what sort of designs are being licenced. Surface pattern design is absolutely everywhere and it’s easy to be inspired.

Favourite pencil/pen?

The Faber-Castell XS PITT artist pen in black has been in my pen of choice for doodling for about the last six months.

Sketchbook or loose leaf?

Sketchbook.

How do you keep yourself on track/organised when working on a project?

I write everything down in my Pukka pad project book. I write endless to-do lists. I’m generally quite good at knuckling down when I’ve got deadlines and I’m not a last-minute-panic-and-work-overnight kind of person. I like to get things done as soon as I can, that way I know the work is done and I can relax or get on with other things.

What are your creature comforts in your studio/workspace?

Music and my headphones are my number one creature comforts and I would not be able to create without them. My graphics tablet is a very close second.

Music, radio, stories or silence?

Music is an absolute necessity to my creative process. I don’t listen to the radio much because I like to control what I’m listening to and I prefer particular tunes that invoke a certain mood that helps me focus on designing. Stories are good too, I’ve recently started listening to some spoken word stuff on Spotify. Sometimes it’s a bit distracting and I can’t divide my attention between the story and designing equally. And of course, the story starts to weave its way into the designs, so I have to be mindful of that.

I prefer silence when I’m reading or writing, but I would find it hard to design to silence.

Night owl or early bird?

A bit of both! In the summer I like to be up early and I think I naturally wake earlier anyway. I love to see the sun rise. In the winter I like to get up when it’s light outside, so it tends to be later. One of my pet-hates is getting up early on winter mornings when it’s still dark outside.

I’m also fond of being up late as well and observing the stillness of the neighbourhood. There’s something weirdly nice about being the only one awake when everyone else is sleeping.

Illustrator or Photoshop?

I use Illustrator for designing and Photoshop for editing photos. I use both all the time so it’d be impossible to choose one over the other.

What size art board do you design repeats on?

My standard is 500 x 500 pixels.

Design heroes?

Lucienne Day, William Morris, Orla Kiely.

Dream clients or design goals?

I’d love to design for Ikea one day. I’d also love to collaborate with a fashion designer and create a collection together.

Dream design destination for inspiration?

I’d love to visit Surtex and Printsource.

And what are you working on at the moment?

I’ve just finished updating my website, so I’m in the process of approaching companies.

Any tips or advice you want to share with us?

If this is advice for people new to surface pattern design or business, I’d say learn the basics of running a business at the same time as you develop your design work because you still need to know how to set a budget, how to write a business plan, how to sell and so on.

Think really, really carefully before buying Facebook ads. It’s a very expensive gamble.

Join LinkedIn if you’re not already on there, it’s full of interesting groups.

Be patient. In the world of licencing everything tends to take longer than anticipated or desired. 

Contact Sophie here:

website - www.honeybelle.co.uk 

Facebook page 

Twitter - @SKHoneybelle

Thanks so much to Sophie for taking the time to tell us a bit about her work. If you would like to be featured as part of Studio Tuesday, please drop me a line at ilovepattern@yahoo.co.uk or DM me on Twitter @ilovepattern.

Frankie x