“My mother is a creative person. I think I inherited my creative skills from her. In fact, she was the one who encouraged me to take up a design course,” says Delphine Gomez.

As an Art Director at Ayesha Harben and Associates, she takes care of the concept, art direction and design of mostly below-the-line products such as brochures, annual reports and pamphlets. “It’s not easy working here as everyone has high expectations of me, especially from myself!” laughs Delphine.

One of her biggest and most satisfying projects was for the Second Global Knowledge Conference (GKII) held in Kuala Lumpur in March 2000 – an event where more than a thousand people from 120 countries met to discuss strategies to put knowledge in the hands of developing countries and the world’s poor.

Delphine was able to single-handedly design and produce the whole campaign, including brochures, banners, videos, notebooks, backdrops and others. “I am most pleased with that achievement. It was a huge project,” she says.

But don’t think that Delphine was a goody-two-shoes at school. “Actually, I was a ‘naughty’ student when I was in college. But the lecturers were always there to guide me in all aspects. They were so dedicated that I actually did not lose track of myself,” she chuckles.

What’s her advice to aspiring designers who wish to follow her footsteps in the future? “Have good people-skills and be skilful in design, deft at using various techniques and savvy in using the necessary software. But being skilful itself is not enough – you also need to set your own style. Don’t just copy from books – always strive for great concepts, art sense and originality.”

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