My portfolio review with Brenda Manley

Have you invested in yourself? I finally decided to book a professional portfolio review with agent Brenda Manley, of Brenda Manley Designs.

Even though I have a degree in illustration, I have spent the majority of my career working as a graphic designer. The past few years I’ve been specifically concentrating on surface pattern designs and illustrations. I’m relatively new to the surface pattern design field, (you can read more about my journey here) and I wanted to get an objective opinion of my portfolio and body of work.

About a year or so ago I reached out to a couple of artists I admire and asked them to review my portfolio. Both were very polite, and offered some insight, but they explained it wasn’t a service they offered. It was for the best because I now believe if you’re going to invest in a portfolio review, you should get a review from an agent as they understand the various markets and know the industry.

I chose Brenda Manley to review my work since she has many years of experience in the industry. She regularly attends industry trade shows and represents very talented artists so I felt comfortable with her expertise.

I appreciated Brenda’s candor and objectivity in looking at my work. It reminded me a bit of my critiques in art school at Syracuse! Brenda gave me practical advice and actionable steps to take to improve. She also discussed trends in the industry and what is working and not working in my designs. She really liked my illustrations of different women (like the one I posted at the top of this page) and suggested editorial work for those. There were very specific changes she mentioned in some of my patterns, but also loved others, the one at the top banner being one.

Here are some comments applicable for all designers:

• Half drop patterns sell best in the U.S.
• Stay away from gradients, looks too computer generated
• Right now hand drawn is in, no more computer vector look. I tend to paint watercolors and a lot of my art has texture and looks hand drawn so I’m happy to hear this. I do have some older pieces that are vector based that I will probably be removing from my portfolio or reworking.
• Think about art in terms of collections and create with a purpose in mind. What would this piece be used for?
• Christmas is still mostly red and green, you can never have too much Christmas in your portfolio

My other takeaway was to not get too attached to any of your art. This is commercial art and it’s different from creating a piece to be hung on a wall. Often designs will get changed by the company purchasing them to best fit who they are marketing to. Sometimes the client will ask you for the change, whether it’s taking out a motif or changing a color scheme, but sometimes there is no time and the art will get changed in-house. You need to be adaptable and ok with this.

All in all, I’m glad I went ahead and invested in myself and had the review.

Have you had anyone review your work? Let me know in the comments below.

Please note: I am not an affiliate for Brenda, I just wanted to share my experience in case you’re thinking of getting a portfolio review.