wejetset - magazine - CARRYING CULTURE

CARRYING CULTURE

Travel Chronicles is an editorial feature for wejetset’s online magazine. Through an open and casual conversation it highlights how travel has shaped the talents, perspectives and experiences of creative and business professionals worldwide. This edition features Brittany Kleinman.

Brittany Kleinman is a practicing designer and avid traveler whose passion lies in responding to the world around her by creating designs that find a balance between object and experience. Brit is currently a designer at Jack Spade and has worked with companies such as Aid to Artisans, Samsonite, and Timberland. She is the co-founder of Grain Design and also runs AVO:Market, a website dedicated to street markets around the world. Brit also regularly contributor to our online magazine on the topic of market culture. We were excited to catch up with Brittany to discuss work, life and how travel has influenced both. Click Read More for the interview and to view the video.

I got into the fabric world of design though a trip I did to Guatemala. I went there and worked with artisans and their textile traditions to create bags that they could make to export, so that they could have sustainable income. They wouldn’t have to go work at a hotel or something like that. They could keep traditions working in textile arts. I just love the idea of weaving, making material that is so versatile. From that point on, I kind of became known as the bag lady. Not the best of nicknames!

When I graduated, I got a job offer from Samsonite to design bags. It made a lot of sense to me to work there because travel was my passion as much as design was. And Samsonite is travel, design and bags all mixed into one, so it seemed perfect for me. With Samsonite, I got to go to St. Petersburg. All of the designers from the company went, and we got to do sort of an inspiration trip… sort of meandered around St. Petersburg and got to see the culture and then come back and use the inspiration for design. I also got to go to China for about three weeks on my own and work. I went to the factories and worked with the people there and altered designs on the spot. That was by far the most eye-opening work experience I’ve ever had, especially coming from our culture, and what we think about manufacturing and then being able to go to this place that we have so many preconceived notions about. I was able to see their culture and see how it all comes together.

I think how I ended up at Jack Spade is directly related to travel and to school. I came into industrial design with a different background and in the end, it made me more successful. I don’t come from a fashion background but instead with a functional industrial design background, and I think that’s sort of why I got the job. I bring something different, a different outlook. And I think because of my travel experiences, I have a different outlook on design. I look at design as a cultural thing. When you design something for you or for me, it’s within our own setting, it’s within our own culture. But if I go to China and I’m designing the same products, maybe it’s used differently, maybe they carry something differently. In Guatemala, they carry things on their head. So as a bag designer, you really have to think about bags as tools, and how people use those tools differently. That is in the essence of why I am a bag designer. If you look at any culture over the world throughout time, there’s always bags. When I travel, that’s one of the biggest things I look at… is how people use everyday objects differently.

In exactly the same way that I see bags as this universal object that can tie cultures around the world together, no matter how different they are, markets are sort of the same way. Whether you’re in New York City, in Brooklyn, in Guatemala or in Morocco… You go to a street market and what they sell might be different, who’s selling it might be different, how they sell it is different… But in essence, the experience and the people’s interactions are the same. And that’s why I love markets. It’s a great way to get a glimpse of the culture and to compare them easily.