Maraid Design Talk

Maraid are a York-based web design duo, but who's main interests in visual culture extend to all sorts of things such as film, print, music covers etc etc. Richard said himself that he started web design because he predicted there'd be a lot of money in it in the future, but also said that he's glad he still does it despite it not being his primary interest, as if you do what you love for your work you end up not loving it - a problem I had on the course in the first 18 months that's now been resolved by not seeing the course as a job - so I totally agree with him on that.

They said that they like to have the clients in the studio with them as much as possible, something similar to what Chris Sayer said, and when I asked them about their location and the merits of it, they seemed to suggest that having a prime location in Yorks City Centre helped with this as clients could make a day out of it.

With regards to clients, they had the following advice:

• Be prepared for them to destroy good ideas.
• People still think of web design as print design on the internet, so it's important to show clients work in it's proper context.
• Talk to the client as much as possible before starting to work with them in order to establish a comfortable relationship with them - making ironing out any issues with them a smoother process.
• Rather than telling your clients you charge an hourly rate, figure out what they want, how long it's going to take you to do it, and quote them an overall price as it helps build trust. Anything they want doing over what they originally asked for should be done at an hourly rate.

In terms of getting work they said running a blog alongside the website is really useful as it convinces potential clients that the designer(s) are real people, especially if the blog is part of a network of something larger like On The Grid as theirs is.

One thing I found particularly useful was Jane talking about how she did freelance work part time when she first started whilst working part-time somewhere else as a financial safety net. This was reassuring because it's something that I'm considering doing myself.

It was also interesting to hear Richard say that regardless of if you're working freelance, in-house, or at a studio, you're always going to be working late and at weekends, so the culture across the three must be fairly similar.

After the talk I asked them about the design community in York as I'm considering it as a place to base myself after uni. They said it was really close-knit and friendly, which was good to hear.