The Designers: Koto’s Vanessa Hopkins on figuring it out while leaving “a little space for the joy”

Our interview series The Designers delves deep into the world’s leading design studios through a series of in-depth conversations with the individuals that make them tick. For the thirty-eight instalment, we had a cheery and motivating chat with Vanessa Hopkins from Koto NY, who unpacks some of the major hurdles and celebrates the big wins of her career so far. As a member of a young studio, she tells us about not only her own growth as a creative in the world of branding, but also that of the studio and the people around her. As part of her life (both inside and outside her role) she delves into the ways she maintains her passion for design, while effectively managing the pressures of daily work and meeting deadlines. Furthermore, Hopkins candidly discusses her experience in overcoming imposter syndrome, the invaluable impact of mentors on her growth as a designer, and her favourite ways to chill out outside of work.

PT Hi Vanessa, how are you?

VH I’m doing great! I’m actually out of the city right now on a little ski trip in Vermont, so I’m definitely in my happy place!

PT Very nice! To kick things off, could you tell us a bit about your background? What sparked your interest in the world of branding and identity systems?

VH I sort of stumbled into it while I was in college. I didn’t know what design or branding was when I was growing up and no one in my life had a career in art or design, so it just wasn’t on my radar as a career option. When I went to college I was initially studying environmental engineering and sometime during my first semester, the art department had come into one of my classes to give a presentation about infographics. At the time, I was doing really awful in my engineering classes and I knew that I needed to find a new major. I had no idea what I wanted to do so I started taking a bunch of random classes; illustration, veterinary science, geology, I was all over the map. But one of the classes I signed up for was an ‘Introduction to Design’ class because of that infographic presentation. I totally loved the introductory class so I dropped all the other random classes I was taking, switched my major to Communication Design and it’s kind of just been rolling since.

The whole team is very ambitious, but that energy is balanced out by us collectively figuring out what the studio can be.

PT And from there, what led you to Koto?

VH After college I started interning at Mother Design and eventually got hired there as a junior designer. I always say that I grew up at Mother. The years I spent there really served as a secondary education for me. We had such a solid team and such cool projects, so it was a really fun ride the whole way through. Then I went to Wolff Olins and went from a very tiny team at Mother to a very, very large team at WO. This was awesome – I worked with some massive brands, and got to work with so many talented people but ultimately I really missed the vibe of being a part of a small team. And that’s what led me to Koto. Now I’m back with a small but very mighty crew and it feels really right.

PT From your experience of working at Koto, what are some of your favourite aspects of the studio?

VH Koto is a really special place. Some of the things that make it special are the obvious ones; cool office, interesting clients, fun parties, etc. But I think there’s some less tangible things going on at Koto that make it really unique. The first thing is that the NY studio is really young. We just opened in New York two years ago and with that comes this underlying energy that we’re the new kids and we really need to make our mark. So the whole team is very ambitious and there’s a lot of care that goes into the work. That ambitious energy is sort of balanced out by the fact that we’re all collectively trying to figure out what the studio can be or what it wants to be, so it has a playfulness to it as well.

I think beyond that, the team really cares about each other. I know that sounds stupid and simple and cliché but I think there’s a lot of trust and comfort among the team, and it allows us to feel free to make mistakes or try things and not feel weird about it. It’s a really great place to experiment and learn, which is what I love most about it.

PT Can you share your experiences of navigating imposter syndrome in your career and how you have overcome it? What strategies or mindset shifts have helped you overcome imposter syndrome and regain confidence in your abilities?

VH When I was younger and just starting out, I used to think imposter syndrome was a symptom of being inexperienced. I’d look at the Senior Designers and think how nice it must be to know how to solve everything and figure it all out, no problem. However, I’m a Senior Designer now and can report that I still get that imposter feeling every once in a while.

My imposter syndrome historically comes up soon after I’ve done something well or have had some sort of success. The thoughts of “Okay, everyone’s going to expect me to do that again, and I’m not sure if it’s going to work next time” start to bubble up. As far as I can tell, this voice doesn’t ever go away, but it does get much quieter. There will always be a challenge that you haven’t solved before and every project is different from the last. There is no formula for figuring these things out so you will always have to push yourself to find the solution.

I think the best way to deal with imposter syndrome is to just go for it anyway. If you succeed you get to stick it to that little voice in your head and if you fail it’s never really as big of a deal as it initially seems. Just go for it again.

PT How have mentors influenced your growth as a designer and helped shape your professional journey?

VH The mentors I’ve had throughout my career have undoubtedly been the most crucial component in shaping how I operate as a designer. I was very lucky that early on in my career I found a lot of people that influenced the way I approach design. In college, it was my professor Edvin Yegir. He introduced me to what design was and he was infectiously curious. He never pushed us but he had the ability to make you want to push yourself, and that’s always stuck with me. When I got my first job I was really fortunate to have worked with a team of incredible designers. Matt Van Leeuwen, Jess Yan, George Lavender, Victoria Herrera, Ross Gendels, they were all working with me during my first few years, and they were all so good at what they did but all in very different ways. I was really young when I was working with them and didn’t really have a sense of who I was as a designer yet, so I learned a lot from just watching them. I watched how they presented, how they spoke to clients, how they assembled presentations, how they approached problems, where they looked for inspiration, everything.

Even though I don’t work with any of these people any more I feel like I have their voices kicking around in my head whenever I’m designing something or struggling to solve something. I don’t know if all of these people are aware that they mentored me or not, but they’re all very special to me.

PT What are some of your favourite ways to unwind outside of work?

VH My favourite way to unwind from work is doing the opposite of what my usual day to day consists of. I find that for me, the most restorative things are being active, being outside, spending time with animals, cooking, anything where I can get some space from a screen and just turn off the parts of my brain that are usually on while I’m at work are the most helpful for me.

The work can demand a lot of you. Not always because of scale or timeline, but because you care.

PT How do you reconcile the idea of finding a balance in your work and personal life?

VH I feel like most designers I speak to are “trying to find a balance” and to be honest I’m not sure how many of us are successfully finding it. I remember in college my professor coming into class one morning totally late, flustered and stressed out from a project he was working on and he looked at all of us and said “this is what you’re signing up for,” which all of us looking back at him, equally flustered and overwhelmed with our respective projects totally empathise with.

I think the work can naturally demand a lot of you. Not always because the project is too large or the deadline is too short, but more so because you care about it. It can be hard at times to call an end to the work because it can always be better. It can always use a second, third or fourth review, and it will often feel like there’s just a bit more you can do.

I don’t think you have to stop caring about your work to find a balance, but you have to figure out a boundary and stick to it. It can be easy to let the working hours creep here and there and say “I’ll solve it this weekend” or “I’ll give it another look when I get home,” but that can create this false illusion that you’ll always have extra time to throw into a project, which can become a slippery slope. I’ve found that time away from work can be just as important as time spent with the work, so trying to give all my attention and energy to it with the hours given so I can have that time away has been really helpful. I’m not saying it’s possible all the time, but it seems to be the best solution I’ve found.

PT Design can be subjective, and self-doubt is common among creatives. How would you say you’ve learned to handle criticism and setbacks?

VH I think this goes hand in hand with dealing with imposter syndrome. Everyone fails or has a set back, everyone makes something that doesn’t work, everyone says something they shouldn’t have in a client presentation, the list goes on. But failing is just a part of the process. It doesn’t matter how many projects you’ve worked on, there will never be a tried and true formula to finding the perfect solution every time. What worked for one project may be the wrong approach for another. Because of this, there are going to be a fair amount of moments of uncertainty and doubt, but I dont think these should be looked at as negative things, even though they can feel quite negative in the moment.

I think what’s helped me the most is framing self doubt, failure, set backs, etc. as just figuring it out. It feels a lot less heavy to interpret all of that stuff as a learning process rather than a mistake. I think just as with dealing with imposter syndrome, it’s important to just keep at it and if it ever feels like too much, it’s important to remember that almost everyone else is doing the same thing and just trying to figure out what works for them.

PT Which projects have you most enjoyed working on? Can you explain the role you played in their creation?

VH I’ve only been at Koto a year and all the projects I’ve worked on are yet to be released, so I can’t say too much here! But every project I’ve been on has been really special. We have a super talented team and beyond anything specifically related to the projects, I’ve really just loved collaborating with and learning from everyone on this team.

Vanessa Hopkins

Koto