When people say “tennis shoes”, K-Swiss is the first thing that pops into your mind, especially since they designed the first all-leather tennis shoe. For 20 years from 1966 to 1986, K-Swiss had only made one shoe, The Classic. Do you believe that? That’s nuts. And when the SI-18 International came out in 1989, it was labeled the “Shoe of The Year” by Footwear News Magazine. The K-SWISS X BROCKY MARCIANO Si-18 International was a fun one to do. Thanks to the team and Brock for trusting me with this one.
MANOR X KSWISS COLLAB
When I was growing up, my grandfather and I would always play golf together. Those early mornings with the smell of grass, steam rising from his coffee mug, and the sound of the club hitting the ball are some memories I would never forget. Doing this project was something special for me because it incapsulated all of those things and more. Golf is a big part of my personal life as a form of therapy. Combining my two loves of golf and design was truly special for me.
KSRC : Kswiss Racket Club
Pretty cool to have a shoe I designed on a billboard. KSRC is an elevated version of classic Kswiss, pulling iconic styles from our past, reimagining them through a creative lens with new materials, colors, and hardware. It was a really creative exercise to collaborate with Anwar Carrots and deliver a collection that combined both heritage and style.
Blast From The Past : Art Center X Vans Sponsored Project
Check out a video highlighting the sponsored project with Vans, which ultimately lead to my first internship. The work was highlighting sustainability within the Vans space and lots of great projects from fellow classmates. Video was taken in the fall of 2014, and during my junior year in college, Cheers.
Inspirational Investment: Figure 8 Farms
Went on a trip with the team to visit a local farm to understand regenerative farming and how it can apply to footwear. Figure 8 farms has around 90 acres located in San Ynez hills producing a wide range of produce and goods. From wine, berries, vinegar, and goat cheese, they manage to have crops year around and have a real effective business that way. We even learned how having cows and goats replenish the soil and help the circularity of things. A great learning experience. Thank you Figure 8 for the tour!
3D DIGITAL DESIGN : ROMANS CAD
I was lucky enough to learn romans cad during my time at Deckers Outdoor. Really rewarding to see all your hard work payoff when the model comes together. Above is a trail ready shoe that I designed and modeled for the fall season. Cant say thank you enough to Mitch Harvey and Cody Thurston for the guidance along the way.
Inspirational Investment : Arcosanti & The Grand Canyon
Its always good as a designer to invest in your creativity. Investing my time into stepping away and gathering from nature or architecture always drove me to thoughts/questions/conversations/ and eventually lead into designing. Getting out and investing in my inner creative is something that I always try to do.
China Travel : Factory Visits
Had the opportunity with my last employer to travel to china and work with the factory one on one. Amazing learning, and definitely makes you a better designer every time you go. Really eye opening experience into the production side of things, and a very humbling cultural experience every time Ive gone.
Graduating Class : Art Center Spring 2017 Product Design
It was a pleasure working and graduating alongside these very talented people during my last semester at Art Center. You can find the work of these awesome designers located on http://accdproductgrads.com/ -Thanks!
Secret Santa : Inspirational Investment
"Inspirational Investment" was an assignment topic in class. Using the collections of things that people brought into class as a starting point for inspiration, create a unique gift for the person that you have been assigned. Above is the card I was assigned and how I broke it down..
The Beginning : Grad Show
Finally graduated spring 2017 from Art Center College of Design. Been a long rewarding road, above are some pictures from my graduation show that I built myself. Enjoy!
Pattern Breaking : Creating a "flag" for Los Angeles.
This was a mini project I did for a class where the assignment was to create a flag that represented LA. While the first initial thought would to design a flag, the exercise is to abstract the idea to avoid cliches.
Who am I as a Designer? : My Business "Card"
I had an assignment to create a business card that reflected who I was as a designer. What I came up with was skateboard wheels with my information on it, and the slogan "Perpetual Design" only because I feel design is a process that is constantly moving and growing. The outer side of the wheel is a abstracted graphic from my logo. Really happy how they turned out! The other pages are a glimpse into my creative process.
Time Travel : Vans Internship Presentation
Above are photos of my final presentation I had at Vans Hq. Had a really had great time working with all the people that helped me enhance my projects. Working with the Innovation team, Active team, and the Pro Skate team really opened me up to create new ideas for the future of skateboarding. Thanks again.
ConceptKicks- Reebok Studio Trainer 1.0
Make sure to check out my studio trainer project that was featured on ConceptKicks.com. The link is attached below...
http://conceptkicks.com/reebok-studio-trainer-1-0-by-ian-dowling/
Disc Golf : Oak Grove, Where It All Began
Recently joined the PDGA (Professional Disc Golf Association). Super stoked! Cant wait to start competing in tournaments. Here are a couple clips from the home course Oak Grove in lovely Pasadena, California. Enjoy!
Reebok : Boston Life
In July of 2015 was accepted to work at Reebok under there apprenticeship program. These are images on my daily routine to and from work. Enjoy!
Skateboarding in the 1980's : homage to skateboarding
I personally think skateboarding in the 1980's was at its most pivotal point. The clothes, the board graphics, the tricks, and the people were all elevated within the idea of style. The ripped up style grip tape, the frontside airs, and the inverts were all starting to have a "look" to them and that look, created the grounding of personal style in skateboarding. This era of skateboarding really started to define the trick language about how to say something on a board. With style comes individualism and thats why I like skateboarding. The independent way you can express yourself is very powerful. I built a skateboard to pay homage to this nineteen- eighties individual style era.
BADASS PEOPLE DO BADASS THINGS : "All in Every This" show setup
I know some badass people that put on these "creative gathering" events. The shows manly consist of live music, makers/crayons, lots of paper, and psychedelic 3D projections . The idea is that since we know lots of people in the design industry, why not bring them all together for an evening of sketching, conversation, good music, and of course... drinks.
VINYL TIME MACHINES : Record stores
Record stores are like musical time machines. Here are some pictures of the local record shop that you can find me at on sunday afternoons. Digging through all these timeless goodies amazes me. As Dj Shadow put it " these records are just hopes and dreams of the past." I feel like the thrill of digging for records culminates with the celebration of the catch. I like the fact that record collecting is like an infinite journey into the past. Record collecting is another fascination of mine that also fuels my passion to create.