Alfred Hoi

Name: Alfred Hoi

What are some of your earliest creative memories and what lead you into design?

When I was a kid, I remember I filled a whole stack of my mum’s post its with these random little drawings and decided to plaster them all over our front door, much to my mum’s dismay. I think from there, that’s when I started to get hooked on art and creativity. Then after a while, I found out there was this thing called ‘Graphic Design’ from my sister who was studying it as a degree and I instantly found my passion call. I guess if it wasn’t for her, I wouldn’t be doing design, so thanks sis!

Who are your top five design crushes right now globally?

If I had to pick five, in no particular order they’d be:

Experimental Jetset — They carry an impressive body of work and have a lot of interesting ideas which I’ve come to apply in my own practice as well.

Eric Hu — He’s always doing good work and his thoughts on the matter of medium in relation to the designer is really interesting as well.

Weirdcore — He does some insane video work, all the while being weird about it which is awesome.

Sons & Co — I think what Tim and Matt are doing with web design is really refreshing and I’m always looking forward to seeing what they come up with next.

Ikko Ikko — I love the work Wade and Leta do and I really appreciate how a lot of it is crazy and out there.

Design work by Alfred Hoi The Design Kids interviews Alfred Hoi work-2

What advice would you give students starting out?

I think being a student can be the most liberating time you’ll have as a designer. It’s a time where you really don’t have a lot of restrictions and it’s just you being you. So my advice would be to let loose a bit and don’t be afraid of being experimental, because once you’re done studying it’s quite likely that you’d be hard pressed to be able to do that kind of stuff again.

Any passion projects/collabs you would like to share?

Currently I’m working on making a bunch of zines on UFO sightings in New Zealand, which the stuff you can find on is really fascinating. I’m also working alongside my mate Luke (who was also a TDK winner last year) on a website based off of the uni project we did together for our final year. On top of all that, I’m a bit a code fanatic, so I’m trying to come up with some interactive projects. So there’s lots to keep me going at the moment!