Amusing stories & views by us
To blog, or not to blog, that is the question. Through these musings, we hope to give you a better sense of who we are, what we believe in, and share our (design) perspective. Below, explore our creative opinion pieces and discover design tips and tricks to use in your daily life.
Culture
Owen
Graphic design and the folk process
My biggest passion is music. I love nothing more than strumming the banjo, playing guitar, and singing in my choir. You may wonder, “It’s 2025? Why play the banjo?” It’s all because of folk music! When I was a child, my granddad handed me a set of jingle bells to accompany him while he played […]
2025-03-28
Read
Culture
Danni
Initiate’s first summer intern reflects on a summer of design
Emilie-Danni was our very first summer design intern here at Initiate. We asked her to reflect on her journey with us. As I sit down to reflect on the final days of my internship, I feel both nostalgic and exhilarated. It’s incredible how swiftly the past few months have flown by, each day brimming with […]
2024-12-06
Read
Culture
Jennifer
A musing about perspective
One of the few good things to come out of the pandemic was more time at home with my husband and business partner. Specifically, more time to go outside for walks was a daily highlight. More often than not, nothing exciting happened in these times. Sometimes, we’d walk for over an hour without exchanging words; […]
2024-08-05
Read
Culture
Leadership
Michael
Hello, my title is not graphic designer
Disclaimer: I’m not trying to offend anybody’s profession, personal opinion or love of the term graphic designer. A lot of people might aspire to be graphic designers. The whole premise is that over the years I’ve seen a lot of people with a lot of roles that are called a graphic designer—a senior graphic designer […]
2024-07-22
Read
Culture
Jennifer
A Rose by Any Other Name Would Smell as Sweet
As my father’s daughter, I’m not shy, quiet, or demure but confident, exuberant, and outgoing. Instead of being described as such, like my dad often was, I was mostly labeled “aggressive.” I can’t remember with absolute certainty ever being told by our father that he wanted sons instead of daughters. But I am confident that […]
2024-07-08
Read
Culture
Christi
Vintage design treasures, by our designers
Some of us seek out vintage items, and some of us have been drawn to an item only to later learn of its robust history. Either way, here at Initiate we’ve realized that most of us own or collect vintage items, or love a good craft market! We want to share our favourite finds with […]
2024-05-27
Read
Culture
Jennifer
Things to consider when applying for a job at Initiate
Hint: it involves some initiative Having recently reviewed countless résumés with spelling mistakes along with portfolios, the ability to focus or pay attention to detail is becoming one of the most attractive skill sets to me as an employer. I’m sharing from the perspective of what Michael and I are looking for from people joining […]
2024-05-13
Read
Culture
Geneviève
Transferable Skills: From Policy Analyst to Graphic Designer
Geneviève is a graphic designer at Initiate. Before venturing into the creative industry, she spent 15 years working in policy analysis. Creativity is a circuitous path Like many designers, my path to creating hasn’t been a straight line. I came to Ottawa to study journalism, political science and public administration in 1994, and spent 15 […]
2024-05-06
Read
Culture
Industry insights
Christi
From student to mentor: the other side of the fence
As a 2021 graduate of this program, I have only been in the industry full-time for about 2.5 years. The imposter syndrome came in hot — thoughts like “I don’t have enough experience,” “I’m not going to give good advice,” and “I don’t know what I’m going to say” raced through my mind. Not to […]
2024-04-16
Read
B2B high tech
Culture
Christi
My move into trade show design
Before Initiate, I had very little real-life experience designing for print from scratch. At a previous print production job, I was using templated sizes for documents, and nothing was larger than 12×18 inches. The company itself was the client since we were designing our own products, and I was sending my files to the senior […]
2024-03-12
Read
Culture
Design thinking
Morgan
HOW did I end up here? Or, my first-ever industry conference
I was the first placement student from Algonquin College that Initiate hired. After just a month and a half with the company, I got to attend the prestigious HOW Design Live Conference in Nashville with the entire team. This is my experience. Diving straight into the deep end After a trip into Academia to study […]
2024-03-05
Read
Culture
Christi
“How was work today?”
Every single evening when I get home, my family asks this question, and every single evening I enthusiastically answer: “It was great!”, “It was so good!” and I mean it I came to this realization a few months into working at Initiate, and a year later there has been maybe one day that was just […]