SideQuesting Designer Series: Kayleigh Doughty

SideQuesting Designer Series: Kayleigh Doughty

SideQuesting logo design by Kayleigh Doughty
SideQuesting logo design by Kayleigh Doughty

SideQuesting is thankful to have ties to the art, music, and design worlds. Each month, we have asked our friends in these industries to recreate our logo in their visions. We think that you’ll enjoy seeing how others view our website, our community, and our passion through their eyes and hands. In return we will present their work for the entire month, and they’ll become our featured artists.

For December 2011, SideQuesting reached across the sea to the UK for our logo design. Artist/Designer Kayleigh Doughty has earned herself a reputation for mixing mediums like she mixes paint, producing vibrant, explosive works of energy that have made their appearances throughout British pop culture. We’re extremely pleased and excited to have her not only create our logo, but also share her work with us.

Marsh T-Shirt Design
Marsh T-Shirt Design

What may sound like a strange statement, Kayleigh is very much inspired by the blank walls she passes on the streets of London. To her each one is a blank canvas, standing at the ready to be populated by what she’s seen recently or felt a connection to. She views white space as a sort of challenge to unload her full mind. She has worked on T-shirt designs, cartoons, and even giant wall paintings for clients, and her “style” translates well across all of the mediums. Thick illustrative lines outline bright colors with only necessary details, so the excess isn’t about what we see in the sketch but what our minds do to fill the spaces in between.

When it came to designing the logo, Doughty followed the same formula. The collection of game controllers scatters onto the page from her memory, creating a backdrop for the dynamic letters that spell “SideQuesting” in the almost “Gamecube purple”. The logo recalls several gaming memories all at once for those that view it, and it’s almost a visual game to try and name each accessory. There’s a certain modern graffiti facet to it that is both complex and simple, and extremely beautiful.

Kayleigh Doughty always starts with a sketch
Kayleigh Doughty always starts with a sketch

When creating her work, Doughty admits to always starting with a concept sketch… or several. There’s something magical about the emptiness of a sketchbook as it almost begs to be filled with ideas. Patterns, random objects, and illustrated characters fill the page. She chooses the medium that is best for the piece, so whether that is spray paint, marker, or digital it’s all very important to remain true to the intention.

Kayleigh has been creating art professionally at least since she was four years old, when one of her pieces was sold on Christmas cards as the result of a major art competition. From then on, she worked to improve her skills and grow her mountain of work, selling canvased paintings and working with major studios and clothing lines. Just recently some of her work was accepted into the Tate Modern, one of the most well-known and largest galleries in Europe.

When we asked Kayleigh about who inspires her work, she relays that a good mix of both traditional fine artists and modern musicians has had an effect on her, as has drawing from her closest family and friends.

Doughty's Rihanna vector illustration was inspired by the video for the song "Hard"
Doughty's Rihanna vector illustration was inspired by the video for the song "Hard"

We’re extremely proud to have Kayleigh as our Featured Artist for the month of December. Please take some time to take a look at more of her work at the links below, follow her on Twitter, and get in contact with her. Her work certainly speaks to her high level of  passion!

Kayleigh has been gracious enough to share some of her pieces below.

Music Pattern
Music pattern for Wrappz.com

 

The latest illustration for Collab Nation
The latest illustration for Collab Nation
Large-scale chicken illustration
Large-scale chicken illustration
"No Boys Allowed" vector illustration
"No Boys Allowed" Keri Hilson vector illustration