This includes projects that I've worked on while working as a freelance graphic designer from: Shirley & Audrey, Curio Cubes, Indiguild, Corestem, and also some of my personal projects as well.
Outside of my graphic design job, I like to draw and create illustrations in my free time! As someone who likes to travel, I love to take inspiration from things that I see in nature or decompress with a favorite show/movie.
If you'd like to see more of my art, feel free to check it out on IG at @shin_leeart.
Part of an Asiatober drawing series in October 2024, where I draw all 12 Zodiacs of the Chinese/Korean Zodiacs chart.
This was actually inspired by a recent travel to Big Island in Hawaii, where I learned about the legends of the goddesses that reside on Mauna Kea. I was so mesmerized by the stories that I felt inspired to create this painting of a snow goddess called Poliahu, who lives on the summit of Mauna Kea, which is the tallest mountain on the world (if measured from the bottom, which is actually underwater).
Watercolor on 8x10, cold-pressed Strathmore paper
From late 2017 to early 2018, I did freelance graphic design for a variety of brands of different industries, ranging from a biopharmaceutical company to a wedding accessories brand. During this time, I wore many different hats: setting up photo shoots, designing books, redesigning websites, and even packaging design.
During this time, I worked as a PR & Marketing Coordinator for Shirley & Audrey, a small wedding accessories brand that was based in CT. I maintained ecommerce, created content for web & social media, sketched and hand-wired sample designs, designed look books and other marketing materials, assisted with photography, and set up photo shoots.
Some examples of the emails & web design work that I did for Shirley & Audrey. This was pretty much my first entry into the email/web design world!
Designing a lookbook for Shirley & Audrey was one of the most exciting projects that I'd ever done for the brand! I also learned a lot about how to set up my print files correctly and it all turned out to be a very successful collaborative effort that resulted in a beautiful book filled with stunning, full-spread images.
In addition to juggling work for Shirley & Audrey, I also worked as a freelance graphic designer for Indiguild, a digital print space that was focused on making digital textile printing more accessible to independent artists. I learned valuable skills with digital textile printing & color profiling, creating surface designs, coordinating photo shoots, designing swatch books, and organizing Powerpoint presentations for meetings.
My favorite project from Indiguild was when I designed a swatch book for them, and the following pictures are a brief snippet of my design process.
Packaging design commission for Curio Cubes, which was a small company that sold state pride products. All product shots of actual packaging were shot by me.
The client wanted a special packaging box to hold the cube that had a specific state plant/flower encased in the clear cube, and I created the illustrations and came up with this basic folding box design that was sent to the manufacturer to make samples of. It was a truly unique and challenging experience, learning how to set up print files for a packaging design and convert hand-drawn illustrations into vector files.
Corestem Inc. is a South Korean bio-pharmaceutical company that developed an innovative stem-cell treatment for ALS. In the fall of 2017, I worked abroad in Seoul, South Korea and worked briefly as a freelance graphic designer for this company before I went back to the States in 2018 (and even in the early 2018, I also occasionally did remote design work for them). I applied my HTML & CSS skills, created mock-ups for website design from creative briefs under a limited timeframe, and worked closely with the PR & marketing team to gain knowledge of the existing projects to get a good idea of the company’s image.