Q&A with Totally Normal Design: Lane Seven's SXSW Design Contest Winner

This article originally appeared in Apparelist. To read more, click here

In partnership with Supacolor, Lane Seven Apparel launched the L7 Merch Tour campaign, coinciding with its presence as SXSW’s official T-shirt sponsor. To get customers involved in the experience, Lane Seven asked them to submit a design to be featured on official tour merch. Among the 20 entries Lane Seven received, one in particular stood out. Brody Driscoll, owner of Dallas-Fort Worth, Texas-based Totally Normal Design, won the contest with a punk-rock-inspired submission.

Credit: Lane Seven Apparel

“We loved that Brody’s design felt totally early ‘90s skate vibes — like it was plucked from the vault,” Alexis Shubin, Lane Seven’s marketing manager, shares. “You know a piece of art is really good when it can capture a place and a time — that feeling, ‘Oh ya remember back in the day?’ That’s what Brody’s design felt like to us.”

Having won the contest, Driscoll not only received $1,000 to use at Lane Seven Apparel and $500 for Supacolor but his design was featured on the flash sheet of designs people could choose from during the live print activation at SXSW.

Asking how SXSW attendees responded to the design, Shubin says, “The SXSW response has been insane! People are totally loving it and have been requesting it left and right at the activation. We are also doing a limited run of the T that we are pressing to giveaway — only 50 will be made. The idea is that it will become one of those super limited, super special, vintage merch collectible pieces.”

We caught up with Driscoll to get more insight into him, his business, and his winning design.

APPARELIST: CAN YOU TELL ME ABOUT YOUR BUSINESS, AND THE KIND OF WORK YOU DO, YOUR TYPICAL CLIENTS, ETCETERA?

BD: Certainly! Totally Normal Design is a full-service design agency specializing in branding, apparel, and packaging design. I’m able to provide clients assistance with the creation and execution of their branding and design ideas. In addition, utilizing the many connections I’ve made in my career, I’m able to provide competitive pricing and oversee the completion of printing/manufacturing of apparel, paper goods, in-store marketing, you name it. If I can’t do it, I know someone who can. While my client history is primarily comprised of brands, bands, and breweries, I’ve done work ranging from mom-and-pop candle shops, professional sports teams, and outlaw rock ’n’ rollers, so I’m happy to assist anyone with their design needs.

APL: HOW AND WHEN DID YOU END UP IN THE GRAPHICS/PRINTING INDUSTRY?

BD: I started purely as a hobbyist by designing album art for a variety of my friend’s hardcore bands. This was before I even knew what ‘graphic design’ was or that you could make a career out of it. After working a few years in retail for Vans and Pacsun and daydreaming about designing apparel for those brands, I decided to go to school to learn the trade and eventually ended up getting hired by my mentor/idol, Paul Sirmon of Sirmon Brand Co. From there, our team worked hand-in-hand designing for Printed Threads in Fort Worth, Texas, and their long list of notable clients where I learned the ins and outs of apparel decoration and branding.

APL: HOW DOES YOUR APPROACH TO DESIGN DIFFER BASED ON WHAT YOU’RE WORKING ON? LET’S SAY, APPAREL VS. PACKAGING OR GENERAL BRANDING VS. APPAREL?

BD: I’d say the approach is no different honestly. It’s all about the end use and answering who is going to be wearing, buying, or seeing the design. It’s a simple idea, but I think as designers, myself very much included, it’s easy to get caught up ‘making something cool’ and completely miss the target market. At our hearts, a lot of designers are artists with a passion to create, so we have to remind ourselves not to ‘create art’ but to instead design a solution to a visual problem.

APL: IF YOU HAD TO CATEGORIZE THE STYLE OF WORK YOU DO, WHAT WOULD YOU CALL IT?

BD: As much fun as it would be to have a defined style/niche, because of the vast variety of the type of clients I work with, I have to be flexible in my style and knowledge in order to fit their brand needs. Ideally, I would design for skate and/or outdoor brands.

Credit: Lane Seven Apparel

APL: SO, HOW DID YOU HEAR ABOUT LANE SEVEN’S MERCH TOUR CONTEST?

BD: A friend of mine sent me the reel on Instagram, and I decided it would be a blast to throw in for it.

APL: DID YOU KNOW YOUR DESIGN PLAN FROM THE BEGINNING? WHAT DID THAT CREATIVE PROCESS LOOK LIKE FOR YOU?

BD: My design plan came about pretty quickly. Not just because I waited until the last second to submit, but because it was more of a passion project. When the submission guidelines mentioned Lane Seven was ‘going on tour,’ the first thing that came to mind was Warped Tour and Dew Tour, so I drew inspiration from those events and tried to make something cool and interesting that I would wear and hoped other people would feel the same.

APL: WHAT WAS THE TOTAL DESIGN TIME ON YOUR SUBMISSION?

BD: I had some rough sketches of the illustration in my sketchbook already, so it was a matter of inking, coloring, and vectorizing that while I laid out some cool type to fit the vibe. After that, I did some mockups and had to make a couple of quick revisions. So in total, it was probably about six-ish hours.

APL: WHAT HAPPENED AFTER YOU WON, AND WHAT’S IT BEEN LIKE COLLABORATING WITH LANE SEVEN AND SUPACOLOR?

BD: After I won, I gained a few new Instagram followers and even had a couple of brands reach out to me for design work. Working with Lane Seven and Supacolor has been great. I’ve always seen them at various conferences and admired their work, so it’s awesome to get to finally collaborate with them, and I’m hoping we can do more work together in the future. *Cough* — call me Lane Seven and Supacolor — *cough* *wink* *wink*.

APL: GIVING YOU A CHANCE TO SHOOT YOUR SHOT AND COLLABORATE MORE WITH COMPANIES LIKE LANE SEVEN AND SUPACOLOR, DO YOU HAVE ANY SPECIFIC PROJECTS OR IDEAS IN MIND?

BD: That’s a great question, and I wish I was better prepared, but I guess I don’t have any specific projects or ideas in mind. More so, I’ve always had a passion to work with apparel companies, and I’m always looking for new opportunities to collaborate.

APL: ANY BIG PLANS WITH YOUR WINNINGS FROM THE CONTEST?

BD: I’m still processing that I actually won! So, I’ve yet to figure it out. I might print some merch for my band, Test My Will, or I might use it for a client, or I might just use it for my wife and I’s Etsy shop (Golden Nomad Shop), where we sell national park art, stickers, and shirts.

APL: TELL ME MORE ABOUT YOU AND YOUR WIFE’S ETSY SHOP – WHEN DID YOU START?

BD: We started our Etsy shop only a year ago with absolutely zero expectations, and now it’s grown way past anything we could imagined! We started on an Epson ET 8550 and a Cricut to make prints and stickers. However, we immediately outgrew the Cricut and went with a USCutter PrismCut. We’ve been outsourcing with print-on-demand services for any larger orders, but we’re in the process of purchasing a 24″ Epson SureColor 7570 to bring those orders in-house and eliminate the PODs. My goal is to sell more stickers so I can justify a Roland BN2-20. All of this is part of a much bigger plan to hopefully start a print shop, so I can vertically integrate my design services with printed goods.