Tag Archives: Spencer Nikosey

HQ:LA Part 3 Spencer Nikosey – Creatives calling LA home

Alumnus Spencer Nikosey at Killspencer in Silver Lake. Photo: Stella Kalinina

Alumnus Spencer Nikosey at Killspencer in Silver Lake. Photo: Stella Kalinina

For creative professionals, the allure of Los Angeles goes far beyond ‘You can’t beat the weather.’ In this series, ‘HQ:LA,’ we invite you to meet three thriving entrepreneurs who have made the City of Angels their headquarters. Today: Alumnus Spencer Nikosey.

Drive four miles northwest from our last stop, and you’ll arrive in Los Angeles’ Silver Lake neighborhood. And it’s here on a stretch of Sunset Boulevard filled with storefronts pitching everything from antique furniture to Spanish-language Pentecostal services, that you’ll find Killspencer, the burgeoning company founded by Product Design alumnus Spencer Nikosey (BS 08).

Killspencer began as a project at ArtCenter in which Nikosey, inspired by a field trip to the American Military Museum, repurposed the tarp of a Humvee into a waterproof backpack.

To say his idea caught on quickly would be an understatement. Killspencer launched as the centerpiece of Nikosey’s graduating portfolio in December 2008; in January 2009 the company began selling products internationally. So why did Nikosey choose to manufacture in L.A.? That was also inspired by a field trip of sorts.

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Fall 2013 Graduation Week: So many faces going so many places!

This Saturday, following years of all-nighters, critiques, finals, internships and hopefully some fun, 153 Art Center students will graduate. As that day approaches, we take time to celebrate these creative and talented individuals who are about to take on the world and, as is custom at our Fall Graduation, we also honor alumni who have already paved the way. Here’s the lowdown for the week.

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Thursday, December 12: Graduation Show Preview
Industry leaders, employers, corporate partners, donors and alumni get the first look at the Fall term’s graduating artists and designers at the invitation-only Graduation Show Preview. This event, hosted by Alumni Relations to welcome new graduates into the community, gives our graduating students an opportunity to network with potential employers and fellow alumni. The show features student projects from major fields of study at Art Center, including Advertising, Entertainment Design, Environmental Design, Film, Graphic Design, Illustration, Photography and Imaging, Product Design, Transportation Design, Graduate Film and Graduate Industrial Design.

Graduation Show Preview will be held at Hillside Campus from 6 to 9:30 p.m., with a private reception immediately following.

Friday, December 13: MDP Work-In-Progress Show
Media Design Practices is holding a work-in-progress show from 6 to 10 p.m. in the Wind Tunnel Gallery at South Campus (950 South Raymond). The MDP/Lab track will be presenting thesis work in progress from their Ciphertexts & Cryptoblob inquiry and the MDP/Field track with be featuring projects from Kampala, Uganda.

Saturday December 14: Graduation
Join us in the Sculpture Garden at Hillside Campus from 4 to 6 p.m. for our graduation ceremony. At the ceremony, we will honor three of our alumni who will be presented with Alumni Awards. This year, all the awardees received degrees in Product Design. Gordon Bruce will receive the Lifetime Achievement Award, Stan Kong will receive the award for Outstanding Achievement and Spencer Nikosey will receive the Young Alumni Innovator Award.

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Watch and learn how KILLSPENCER came to life

Back in 2008, well before the concept of a design entrepreneur had been exalted by futurists as the driving force behind the next wave of innovation, Spencer Nikosey, was ahead of the curve, approaching his work as an Art Center Product Design student with the ambition and enterprise of an MBA. Nikosi staged his own pop-up product launch event at Art Center’s Grad Show, where he began selling his nascent line high-performance men’s luggage, bags and accessories. Five years later, Nickosey has turned KILLSPENCER into a sought-after brand and model of sustainability with a line of products produced in his workshop in Downtown L.A. and sold in his recently opened Silverlake boutique.

In the above video, produced by Bluecanvas magazine, Nikosey re-traces his path to finding his foothold as a design entrepreneur. He makes fascinating pitstops throughout the piece, exploring his approach to creativity, innovation, business and his dreams for a future that includes an oceanside multi-media creative collective, where he’ll make films and products and occasionally run and jump off the roof into the ocean. Judging by Nikosey’s track record thus far, it’s only a matter of time before he takes the flying leap.

Graphic Design Students Ready for Their Closeups

Still from student Sang Chung's video profile of student Bo Yeoung Han.

Graphic Design students in last summer’s Advanced Graphics Studio course were given an unusual assignment. Each of the students, none of whom had prior experience shooting live action video, were asked by instructor Petrula Vrontikis to collaborate with one of their classmates to create two- to four-minute promotional videos of one another.

The students were given approximately six weeks to research, storyboard, interview and to learn the basics of contemporary digital shooting and editing. Motion Graphics instructor Rob Garrot provided the students with support and insight from a video editors perspective, and a number of professionals came to class to provide critical feedback, including product designer Spencer Nikosey PROD ’08 of KILLSPENCER, whose video profile for Behind the Hustle was a partial inspiration for the course.

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Filling in the Blank: Students Bringing TEDx to Campus

Class shot of the TEDx Art Center College of Design Studio. Photo: June Korea.

Orange will mix with red this summer when the student-driven TEDx Art Center College of Design conference takes over the Hillside Campus on Saturday, June 9 to explore the event’s theme: “Design a ________ for Social Impact.” The “blank” in that title is a call-to-action designed to inspire conference attendees to come up with their own idea for how to effect positive change in the world.

Also on hand to inspire attendees will be an impressive lineup of speakers, including Doug Powell, national president of AIGA and the individual spearheading that association’s Design for Good initiative; and Cameron Tonkinwise, chair of Design Thinking and Sustainability at Parsons The New School School for Design, whose current research is exploring design-enabled sharing of resources. And for something completely different, Art Center Product Design alumnus and KILLSPENCER founder Spencer Nikosey has been tapped to provide the day’s musical entertainment.

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Lynda Weinman, Shepard Fairey and Spencer Nikosey on Campus for this Thursday’s 3×3 Presentation

Each term, Art Center’s Graphic Design Department hosts a 3×3 presentation in which three creative professionals are invited to speak on a particular topic.

This Thursday, the Art Center Community is invited to hear stories from three pioneers who have created reality from their dreams and gone on to influence design, culture, art, technology and fashion worldwide.

The speakers are:

Shepard Fairey, Artist, Activist and Founder, OBEY GIANT ART and Studio Number One

Lynda Weinman, Co-Founder and Executive Chair, lynda.com

Spencer Nikosey, Founder, KILLSPENCER

Moderated by Petrula Vrontikis

3×3: Creative Entrepreneurs
Thursday, March 22nd, 2012
7:30 p.m. – 9:30 p.m.
Ahmanson Auditorium
Art Center College of Design
Hillside Campus
1700 Lida Street
Pasadena, CA 91505

FREE; no reservations required.

Lynda Weinman, co-founder and executive chair of lynda.com, is a self-taught computer expert, author, educator, and entrepreneur. Before launching lynda.com, she was a faculty member at Art Center College of Design and worked as an animator and motion graphics director in the film special effects industry. Lynda has also been a consultant for Adobe, Macromedia, and Microsoft, and has conducted workshops at those organizations in addition to Disney. She, along with her husband and co-founder Bruce Heavin, evolved lynda.com from its original concept as a free web resource for her students, to the site for her books on Web design, to the registration hub for physical classrooms and conferences, to a highly successful online training library. lynda.com

Shepard Fairey was born in Charleston, SC in 1970. He received his B.F.A. at the Rhode Island School of Design in Providence. While at R.I.S.D. he created the Andre the Giant as a Posse sticker that transformed into the OBEY GIANT art campaign with imagery that has changed the way people see art and the urban landscape. His work has evolved into an acclaimed body of art which includes the 2008 “Hope” portrait of Barack Obama which can be found in the Smithsonian’s National Portrait gallery. Since the beginning of his career in 1989 he has exhibited in galleries and museums around the around the world, indoor and outdoor. His works are in the permanent collections of the MOMA, the Victoria and Albert Museum, the Boston ICA and many others. For more information, visit obeygiant.com

Spencer Nikosey launched his premium bag and luggage brand KILLSPENCER at his Art Center grad-show in 2008. Handcrafting functional Weekender Bags, Backpacks, and Messenger Bags out of used-in-combat military truck tarps and vintage Korean War Era fabrics caught the attention of bloggers and instantly kickstarted an online following and customer base. Soon, demand increased and local production became problematic. Frustrated with the lack of quality and attention to detail in local factories, Spencer decided to assemble a team of master craftsmen and build his own Workshop in the Downtown Los Angeles Arts District. Today, Spencer and his team of passionate creatives designs, develops, manufactures and ships their products globally, proudly made in U.S.A. killspencer.com