Design Fundamentals: Layout and Composition with Bedar Hassan

They say you can’t learn to swim in a library or in other words a hundred books on swimming cannot prepare you for the water like the first plunge would. This past year Khud educators and team members have been grappling with similar ideas to tweak our design teaching methodology in ways which best prepare students for the seemingly uncharted waters the professional world could be for novices like them. We have learnt that maximum exposure and interaction with the professional sphere is the only way to ensure that students have the right toolkit for a time when they are in the market for work themselves. Market oriented practice sets and mentorship from experts is the way to go – we have seen.

Bedar Hassan - Co-Founder Gloria9 - in action

To connect the right mentors with students we have initiated a weekly workshop series where highly respected industry professionals are called on to shed light on design fundamentals and talk about their own portfolios.

 This past week our guest speaker was Bedar Hassan who is a self-taught graphic designer and Co-founder of Gloria9 – a design agency based in Lahore. Hassan’s example was particularly motivating for the students as he too does not have any formal design education and started off just like them with a desktop computer, he shared with other family members

Hassan’s workshop was based on explaining the basic principles of layout and composition (proximity, contrast, alignment etc.) which is thought to be a foundational tenet of not just graphic design but any kind of visual art. He sifted through his company’s portfolio and described the design thinking behind each piece with special focus on layout and composition. The workshop also ventured into some other important themes such as typography and color theory and Hassan gave some nifty tricks to overcome commonly encountered problems in these domains. After he had gone through his slides, he moved on to reviewing the students’ latest work and pointed out areas of improvement.

The whole workshop was duly punctuated with curious questions from the students, and everyone scribbled notes throughout it. Excitement was palpable and really showed whenever Hassan asked a question; a flurry of hands shot up every time. Ever since the workshop students have been glued to their workstations, discovering all the resources Hassan shared with them and are working with renewed enthusiasm to improve in their weak areas.

Students listen intently as Hassan shows them some simple tricks to improve their work

We are excited to see how the rest of the planned guest lectures pan out and will keep sharing notes from the ground so our friends online can stay updated about students’ progress.

Graphic Design cohort poses with the guest speaker