Working With Your Art Director. When Your Art Director is Also Your Roommate

For our latest assignment, my roommate, Jesse and I were paired together. You may recognize him from his own blog, which includes such classic posts as “Blend Tec: Chuck Norris Edition,” “This man either has terets or hates Rick Boyko,” and my personal favorite, “AHHHH! I GOT HIT BY A JAVELIN.”

Good stuff. Good art director. Great guy.

The last two weeks were devoted solely to Sylvia’s Soul Food Restaurant, which, coincidentally, also has its own supermarket food line. Only problem is, even though it’s been a Harlem establishment for more than 40 years, no one outside of NYC has any clue what Sylvia’s is, nor gives a shit that you can buy it in your local store.

Not an easy one to crack, to say the least.

Here's their logo to give you an idea of what I'm talking about. The picture is about 16 years old.


I'd be lying if I said I wasn't nervous about working with Jesse on such a big assignment. I’d worked with another roommate, Tristan, last semester, which went great, but two writers working together is an entirely different, easier dynamic. After all, we see things the same way.

I’d heard of horror stories of friends never speaking again after a terrible work experience.

And they didn’t live together.

So you can imagine my shock that we escaped this week not only not wanting to kill each other, but with a newfound respect for one another’s craft and a fairly decent (albeit unexpected) campaign to boot.

While I’m at it, I feel compelled to state the fact that I am incredibly grateful for the amazing people that I live with. Each are among the most intelligent and insightful people I've ever met, and each is at the top of his respected track of study. Although the distant future is long off, I am already excited to see what they'll do for this business in the many years to come.

The fact that we get to come home and both bitch and gloat to one another is something I try not to take for granted. Few people have what we have.

It's something I'll always look back on fondly.

It’s also something I'll miss when graduation comes and we each enter the real world on our own in (uh-hu.....) fifteen short months.

Who will there be to bitch to then?

dubs. out.