The idea for this site came from my desire to keep in touch with real creativity, original and unique creations by the many talented people who craft and design. It’s been many years now that the web kept sadly becoming more and more formulaic. Many sites look the same, few risks in design approaches are taken and the web which once inspired me is fading and more difficult to find. The arrival of automation and AI tools now causes even more rubbish (in my view anyway). It was time to celebrate creativity as a beautiful human endeavour. To showcase the brilliant minds who still value originality and the craft of creating – be that in traditional media such as clay, wool, wood or paper, or digital such as illustrations and artwork.
This website’s focus is all about creativity of any kind. My plan is to post inspiration and links to sites which showcase the amazing work published online. At this time, everything is in flux and I look forward to letting this site evolve and hope you will find it interesting and inspiring.
The second purpose of the site is to be the parent site of becreative.spot – a site which will soon be offering tutorials on using only free software to create art and design. The site has only just been set up and is still very much work in progress. For now, I will focus on completing the planned content for this site ツ
Creativity for a happier mind
Another aspect which drove this idea is the talk of how many people feel overwhelmed these days with the onslaught of information overload. Many of my friends, my clients and their teams and as well as my students tell me how they feel simply mentally exhausted and trapped in cycles they feel are not healthy for the state of their minds. We are bombarded with too much media, and depending on our personal habits, this can bring horrid news of the world: politics is merely depressing wherever we look. Our planet and its natural beauty is suffering. Social media is polluting the web with nastiness and rubbish.
This is where I feel our own creativity can help ~ it can rescue our minds and souls from some of this distress. I know that personally I felt happier, healthier and stronger again once I returned to doing bits of artwork again as a way to switch off my mind. I’d like to encourage anyone to try and see if it could help ツ And you do not need to be an artist or designer, or know how to draw. Doodling and only possibly taking it further into actual drawing or painting can be a remedy. It can help momentarily. It can become a habit to let your mind escape the stress, ease anxiety and let you relax ~ helping you to feel better and happier in the long run ツ
A lot of what The Creative Spot is all about creativity, connection, and having fun with the things we make ~ finding the joy in being creative. And when I was invited to chat with Anthony (ozone) on FiresideFedi it was a lovely opportunity to talk a little more about all of this.
FiresideFedi chat with Anthony/ozone
This all started because one of my wonderful Mastodon followers, eclexic, told me how much he loved my art (◠‿◠) so I made him a desktop wallpaper from his chosen piece. This was on screen during his own Fireside chat and caught Anthony’s eye ~ and the invite followed.
I had such a lovely, giggly chat with Anthony (ozone): nominally about the Fediverse. But we ended up covering pretty much everything web: owning your own corner of it, why The Creative Spot exists, and why doodling beats doom-scrolling every time.
There was a little bit of CSS banter as well (he made it clear he’s not a fan and then tried to horrify me with !important and inline styles ~ it worked!). We also talked about how much it saddens me to see so many wonderfully creative people putting their work on corporate-owned platforms instead of a space of their own; and about my teaching philosophy that design and code are one craft, not two separate skills to specialise in. And yes, things got properly silly towards the end ツ
You’re welcome to watch the whole thing here ~ laughter, tangents and all.
watch video
You can find Anthony (ozone) on the Fediverse at @ozoned@btfree.social, his link hub at links.btfree.org, and more FiresideFedi episodes at tubefree.org.
about me
In short: I’m a designer, educator and artist and I love the web. There are a few different sides to my activities and if you are curious, you can read about my journey into webdesign on my blog, an addition to Design for web (A handbook for aspiring web designers which I published for anyone getting into webdesign) and about my love for art on my art website, terra nostra. I take pride in working on inclusive and accessible design projects, happily doing both visual design (for print and screen) and coding with web standards. I love open source and now specialise in WordPress and work on amazing projects with my lovely little team. As design tutor, I teach at the Unviversity of Greenwich (on the MA Web Design & Content Planning) and at the University of Sheffield (on the MA Digital Media & Society). While I do take commissions, I create my artwork mainly for pure personal joy – you can find it on terranostra.life, shared primarily on mastodon.art.
Find out what I’m focusing on at the moment.
Contact
Please don’t be shy – I’m always happy to hear from people. If there’s anything wrong with this site, or if you have any thoughts or feedback for me, you’re most welcome to get in touch ツ I’d love to hear from you.