The Story Behind My Design Career

I believe in the power of design, and I have committed a large part of my life to work studying how to communicate an intention through beautiful visuals. The path to where I am now has been a journey through defining my identity and intentions and can be a long and heavy story. But in this article, I will give a lighter summary of the main events that have occurred so far in my journey.

I grew up in a snowy and meagre suburb just outside of Edmonton, Alberta. I lived in the countryside and attended quaint local schools. My love for art, music, and dance was apparent throughout my childhood, and I was sure by my teens that I wanted to incorporate creativity into my future career. In high school, I accelerated through my core courses to take advanced fine arts classes. My love for beautiful visuals was fostered through these formative years by teachers, my family, and others older than me who identified a gift for design in me and emboldened me to pursue and develop my talents. So with this encouragement, at age seventeen, I moved from my tiny town to Vancouver.

I started my post-secondary education at the University of British Columbia (UBC) in the Faculty of Arts, focusing my studies on sculpting and contemporary art. After completing two years of these visual arts studies, I entered the School of Architecture and Landscape Architecture at UBC. My major was an Honours Bachelor of Environmental Design: the study of spatial parameters, plans, programs, policies, buildings, and products.

Snippets of my early work. Sculptural, traditionally artistic, and analytical design projects from my teenage years.

With this background, I moved into my master's degree. I currently study at the Harvard Graduate School of Design and am completing my degree in architecture. This more technical design education has given me the capacity to move into interior styling and storefront design. My artistic training has empowered me with the theories of aesthetics that allow me to excel in graphic design and branding. To support my visual sensibility, I am cross-registered at MIT's Sloan School of Management, where I study marketing, psychology, behavioural economics, and brand strategy. Over the years, I naturally began to design for clients and leaped into creating a business around it in the summer of 2020, when Atelier Oluwatosin launched. Since then, my team and the scope of what I do have continued to grow as I become more well-versed in all areas of visual design.

Overall, growing up as a creative, I am accustomed to expressing myself through music, drawing, writing, and the arts in general. I design intending to help people to experience and emit elegance. I strive for all of my work to be sophisticated, timeless, and bespoke. I draw inspiration from my clients. Driven by details, I find joy in aiding people and brands in curating the message that they would like to communicate. I am so grateful for you (yes, you). Thank you for supporting me and following my journey. To peek into my day-to-day, you can find me on Instagram @tosinodugbemi.

XO, T.