Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Simon Walker. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Simon, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. We’d love to hear about when you first realized that you wanted to pursue a creative path professionally.

As a young teenager in England in the 80s, I fell in love with hip hop culture – and with graffiti in particular. Everything about it was absolutely mesmerizing to me. So I studied and copied it and doodled graffiti’d words into my school workbooks – usually instead of doing my actual work. From that point forward, I’d always loved and enjoyed lettering in and around art without ever consciously understanding the framework within which it existed and the potential it had for my future.

Nevertheless, I was at college in San Antonio a couple years after graduating high school, half-heartedly pursuing some vague interests in the sciences without any real direction, when I decided to take a drawing class as an elective. For one project in particular I created two illustrations that combined visuals and custom lettering; my teacher took one look and said, “This is graphic design.” I said, “What’s graphic design?” He spoke to me after class and explained everything he knew about the graphic design field (which I’m sure I listened to in its entirety with my mouth wide open) and even gave me a brochure for the University of North Texas, which I subsequently attended. It was a thunderous, life-altering moment. I don’t remember that teacher’s name, but I honestly owe him everything.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.

I’m a custom lettering artist, font creator and graphic designer living in Chicago. I divide my work almost 50/50 between creating fonts for my website, beastsofengland.co, and creating one-off, custom lettering pieces for individual clients, which you can find at simonletters.com. I started my career as a regular graphic designer back in 2000 in Texas, working at a handful of different agencies from San Antonio to Austin to Dallas. At some point, client demand for custom-lettered branding (as opposed to just selecting fonts for any particular brand) began to increase, and I found myself – almost out of necessity – exploring the world of custom lettering. Within that growth process some latent part of my brain that had, in childhood, been obsessed with the graffiti art of the hip hip scene of the 80s began to be revived, and step-by-step I found my career morphing into the one I practice today.

Can you share a story from your journey that illustrates your resilience?

About 10 years ago when I left agency life to go full-time freelance, I did as everyone advised and planned ahead and had about $10K in my bank to help offset the potential tough days that would inevitably come in those first months. Sure enough, despite having a fairly robust freelance career at the time, we soon found ourselves strapped for cash. We moved to a smaller place, cut every expense we could, and started to think about ways to put more proverbial irons in the fire (one being my font site, Beasts of England). Meanwhile, we borrowed from parents, borrowed from banks, juggled bills, and somehow scraped by month after month, never knowing for sure whether the cash would continue to flow at all. But somehow it always did – even if just a little bit at times. There was never a moment when I was without at least one job, or waiting on at least one check to arrive. And after some serious lows, I’m finally in a place where things feel established and comfortable. But to say I wanted to throw in the towel at times would be an understatement. At one point about five or six years ago, I sat with a friend who was a higher-up in an amazing, well-respected agency in Austin and practically begged him for a job. He said he would hire me on the spot, but warned me: “you won’t be happy.” And I wouldn’t have been. I weathered that storm and will likely weather others, but I’m always so grateful to have made it this far.

For you, what’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative?

The great joy of being a creative is that it sort of folds itself into and informs every other creative interest of mine. When I read a beautiful book, it will have nothing at all to do with my career, but it will stir something new in me that will somehow manifest in my work. Similarly with music – I listen to music all the time, and have even joked on occasion that lettering is just the thing I do while I listen to music. I’m not a musician of any kind, but when I fall in love with a new artist or album, some synapses somewhere in my brain snap together and my creative output moves in a slightly new direction. The one thing I can never stress to up-and-coming creators enough is that it’s never good to have just one main interest in life and to make it your career, whatever it is. Put down the tools of your trade, whatever they may be, and read some fiction, or a book about trees, watch movies, listen to records, meet your neighbors, engage in social activism, adopt a dog. If you don’t round out your character beyond your career, your work may be technically unimpeachable, but you risk it becoming mechanical and lifeless.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.simonletters.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/simon_letters/
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/simon_letters
• Other: https://beastsofengland.co/ https://www.instagram.com/beastsofengland/ https://twitter.com/beastsofengland

Image Credits
Profile picture by Jacqui Oakley