Now anything that involves free beer is pretty much high on my list of awesome. Add in crazy designers then it goes up yet another notch. The Local Taphouse was like most pubs, old and somewhat difficult to get up to the top floors, but the roof top beer garden is quite perfect for events like this. As an added bonus I was able to see the nightly dusk migration of the bats. Amazing what you can miss and forget, when I lived in Darlinghurst I used to sit and watch the clouds of bats cover the sky at dusk, it was like seeing an old friend.

But more about AGDA, as someone who has been a member of twenty odd years, it is always good to meet up with enthusiastic designers who want to be part of something more than just their day to day job.

I seem to find myself talking to people who are either icons of the design community or happen to be fixtures of design in general in this country. I guess after being in the industry for so long, people recognise my face and although half the time can’t put a name to it still recognise me as a fellow designer. (Or perhaps just a fellow drinker)

There was talk of pitches, slagging off the slackers who didn’t make the night, even to the ever constant talk of free pitching over paid pitching. I won’t go into detail but for most designers the idea that they could do a fortnights hard work and see nothing for it (even to the point of having their ideas used and recycled into a creative brief for a different designer) just seems ludicrous. You don’t tell your plumber to fix one of your drains and if you like how he does it, you will hire him to do the rest. Maybe there is a method or system that can be put in place to help shake things up, but until we find a way to get all the designers on board, it will be fraught with problems.

Well, if you we’re there I hope you enjoyed yourself, if you weren’t well you missed out BIG time! Look for me in the photos on the AGDA NSW site of the night, you may even spot me with beer in hand.

Oh and many thanks to whomever packed my goody bag from the night, there was lots of stuff to look through on my long train ride home. 😉 I am looking forward to seeing the events for 2013!