Designers 9 & 10

Adriane Grumbein

Adriane works in the ISC program and teaches creative advertising and graphic design. She did her undergraduate at the University of Texas where she was an art major, but later changed to ISC with a minor in design. She initially decided to switch majors because she was doing 40 hour artwork that was taking great artists only 2 hours to do. She has been at UK for a couple years now and really enjoys teaching!

I actually met Adriane last semester while I was in a journalism class. She was teaching a creative advertising class and I got to see the work that these kids were doing. It was a lot poster looking designs. After Adriane shared with our class some of her works on her portfolio, it was obvious to me that the class I saw her teach last semester was right up her alley. 

Although her main job is teaching, she still tries to find some free lance work. She believes that free lance work keeps her mind sharp when it comes to what's new in design.

"To me, design is problem solving," said Grumbein. Art and design are two very different things. Art evokes a feeling. Design is problem solving. 

Lately, Adriane has been focusing on working with IPR to create new flyers for the company. 

Adriane believes that big data, infographics and personalization is what is to come in the design world. She closed her speech by saying that social media has changed design for her in some ways. Social media has made the work she does sharable.

Mitzi Vernon

Mitzi is the Dean for the College of Design. She sat down with us and shared her story, immediately beginning with her schooling. She majored in housing and interiors at North Carolina. She claimed this was her favorite degree when it came to diversity. Mitzi could not stop raving about her great experience here where she learned about landscape architecture, photographers, housing issues and more. 

Next, Mitzi went for her masters at Virginia Tech. She called this her biggest intellectual leap and Virginia Tech instilled in her the importance of an open studio. She said you need open space to see what everyone is doing so you can learn from one another and get that exposure. 

When she was 23 years old, Mitzi decided to be part of an interiors program at at Arizona State. After this she took a leave of absence where she moved to Los Angeles to do projects and teach part time at USC.

Stanford came calling while she was teaching part time at USC so Mitzi traveled there to focus on product design and engineering. After 3 years, she decided to go back to Virginia Tech to be part of the industrial design program. Mitzi stayed there for 20 years! 

Her latest (and greatest) move was to UK after she got the call to be the Dean of the College of Design. 

Looking back on all these moves Mitzi said, "I can't imagine unstitching my life." You can really tell she has enjoyed her life thus far to the fullest. 

When asked about the latest issues and new design concepts were she focused on concept of "design thinking". 

She ended her speech by sharing a motto of hers that I will never forgot. "Live well, buy only good stuff, recycle the rest." LOVE THIS!