hellomarine

Hellomarine, aka Marie, is not only an award-winning graphic designer and a part-time lecturer on BA Graphic Design at the University of Portsmouth, but also a new People of Print Member. Marie has been designing in print since 2006 when she worked as a designer in a local print house where she hassled for old print plates and stood watching her own artwork printed on a huge Heidelberg wanting to know every step of the process. But this wasn’t enough, so she decided to start a degree in Graphic Design (at Portsmouth) in 2007.

Shortly after graduating with a first class honours, Mari won a National Print Futures Award in 2011. A few months after graduating she was contacted by ilovedust, an award-winning studio on the south coast, to work on print and type projects – she worked full time at ilovedust as a graphic designer for a year before pursuing teaching and continuing to freelance specialising in print. As well as freelancing and running her business Marie has taught at the University of Portsmouth on BA Graphic Design since 2013 as a part-time lecturer. She also teaches graphic design, book design and print production on BA Fashion & Textiles and for the School of Architecture on MA Interior Design.

With a self-confessed obsession with print and type, Mari is in the process of expanding her business with her partner (and husband) luckydarren a fellow designer, illustrator and lecturer. Since starting their family they wanted to produce beautiful things about things they were and are passionate about and in the mediums they enjoy. This led them to the purchase of a riso printing machine, unearthing their proofing press, Adana, silk screens and also managed to make room for a foiler. Under the brand ‘foursandeights’ they produce prints and stationery as well as offering riso printing, screen printing and letterpress.

This summer saw the debut of this creative duo beginning to run workshops in foiling, bookbinding and Adana letterpress printing. Owning a young family can make things hard to juggle, however not for this super-mum! She turned this aspect of her life into creating something fun, creative and enjoyable for others also. Marie and her partner have ventured into launching Southsea beach print workshops (one day it’ll be from their beach hut) which you can attend with your kids and learn to expose a screen with the sun and print your design of treasures you’ve found on the beach in soya ink. While the screens expose they do a mini beach clean with biodegradable bin bags too.

Another project that Marie has recently started is #YESMUMMA, a free print project which supports and thanks women breastfeeding in public to help normalise breastfeeding through small cards of empowerment. Each card made is intended to be passed on to the next person they see breastfeeding in public and so on. The project has gotten much bigger than expected and Marie tells us how humbled she is by the love that has been felt for the project, the stories of how empowered and supported mums have felt after receiving a card from a stranger and how it’s encouraged them to continue to feed is incredible.

It’s clear that Marie is fully confessed print geek, someone who lives, breathes and is passionate about print. An ideal candidate for our own team perhaps..

Do you want to become a People of Print Member? APPLY HERE.

hellomarie.co.uk