Fascination Design has been creating quality print products such as brochures, business cards and even publications since March 23 of 2000.
In 2001 a client begged us to develop their e-commerce site and we’ve been developing various types of websites ever since.
What’s your style?
Laid back, doesn’t like hard sales (sales pitches that are all pitch), I am pleasant and friendly but I can also be blunt. I promise to listen and collaborate with you but I will also express my ideas and knowledge. I’m definitely not a “yes-man” or “code monkey.”
Who is your ideal client?
Hilary Baumann, Owner
<I’m not going to talk about myself in the 3rd person!>
My interest in art and computers started at a young age. I don’t remember a time when computers or drawing tools were not in my house growing up. In 6th grade I joined the yearbook staff and worked on my first page layout. It was “paste-up” so no design on computers yet but the process to becoming a graphic designer had officially begun. In high school I formed a creative arts publication that was paid for entirely by ad revenue. The publication ran 3 years, 22 issues, 200 copies per issue and close to monthly during the school year. I was written up for this endeavor in a local newspaper, the Lexington Herald-Leader. Two column interview and photos, a big deal for a high school student. I also created my first website in 1997 for the same creative arts publication.
My first “real” job in the industry was freelancing as a graphic designer. While freelancing my main client was a local typesetting company that hired me after I proved I could layout a business card using Pagemaker and Photoshop. I’m not sure if they knew or not that I had only had a two hour crash course with my old 6th grade yearbook teacher in the two programs the day before the interview. I learned a lot about the printing process and pre-press over the next year.
But the entrepreneurial bug bit. I hadn’t read all of those Forbes magazines as a kid for nothing. I wanted to work directly with the small businesses. Freelancing at the time was still more like being someone’s temporary employee without any of the employee benefits. I wanted to cut out all of the middle men and some of the confusion. I wanted to run a business!
I joined several local groups and forced myself to not be a wallflower so I could network with small businesses. I built up my client base. I refined my process and project sheets. And I’m going to spare you bad details like non-paying clients and the fallout from that sort of thing. Let’s just say I learned a lot. I wouldn’t do much of it over because it was a good learning experience / school of hard knocks sort of thing.
Originally my goal was to grow and hire employees but I found that what worked well was partnering with other designers, developers, freelancers and small firms collaborating on a per project basis. I’m a bit of a project manager, a bit designer and a bit coder and it’s a very unusual combination. I’ve also been told by a couple of my clients that I’m a bit of a business counselor!
Where is Fascination Design headed then? I want to continue to improve and refine and grow my business, my skills and my network. I want to continue to provide excellent quality work that helps my clients’ businesses. I want to have a bit of fun doing all of this and hopefully you will too!
Check out the portfolio pages to see all of Fascination Design’s accomplishments!