Conversations with Lionel Taurus

Today we’d like to introduce you to Lionel Taurus.

Hi Lionel, please kick things off for us with an introduction to yourself and your story.
I’m a Staff Product Designer at Squarespace, a product design company that makes accessible website creation to every entrepreneur in the world. I’m working in the Concepts team in the company. My job consists of finding innovative ways to showcase user content on digital support and envisioning the future of web design and technologies for the platform.

Design is something that was always growing around me in my life in different forms, I just didn’t know yet how to make it my own, develop a passion for it, and how to make it a full-time job.

I’m coming from a very modest family and grew up in the Caribbean islands until I was 17 years old. A lot of parameters came into place before becoming interested in design. I used to draw a lot of comics and animals when I was younger just for the sake of fun with my twin brother. My mother is a very meticulous person and was also painting from time to time. My oldest sister, one of the biggest influencers in my career and life, was in art school which inspired and intrigued me the most because it was something different and more tangible to me than the generic path that everyone was following with math, science, or literature classes.

As a kid, I was very curious and attentive to design systems and how things were built. I remember breaking apart a lot of toys to understand how things were working from an engineering standpoint and trying to figure out and understand the system holding things together for them to function. (I was grounded quite a lot for that!)

All those things combined and people around me eventually led me to take an artistic path, with a deep passion for exploring new software and tools while working in different environments to expand my skills and design.

This translated after to my college path when I left the Caribbean to go to France to study Visual Communication in Chaumont, a place holding one of the biggest international poster competitions in the world since 1990. The adventure was just getting started. Two years after graduating, I moved to the south to study Graphic Design in Valence, then left with a diploma in hand to Paris for the Interactive Media program of Gobelins, the school of image.

Fast forward, my career jumped from advertising to a gaming company, a creative studio, an interactive agency, a digital studio, and finally Squarespace, a product company, and here I am. Diversity was the key factor that opened my perspective on design and also made me the designer that I am today.

Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
Stepping into the design world was not an easy road. To be a designer is a very challenging job but the satisfaction to see your work out in public or used by others is amazing and exciting. You need to learn consistently and adapt to new tools and software as technologies are evolving rapidly.

One of the biggest struggles I encountered in my career was racism and ignorance. Coming from an island, a lot of people always had this false image of us being lazy, assumed that I was relaxing on the beach every day. I was even asked once if I was going to school. At the time, I considered it was only wild thoughts from ignorant people. I thought deep inside me that it was nothing else until I was 17yo and moved to France for college and got flat out ignored at the beginning of an interview meeting to attend a school I applied for. The interviewer entered the room, saw me with my mother and sister accompanying me, then reported to the secretary that she didn’t see anyone in the room and left.

After finding a school, getting an internship when I was not coming from a famous school was not any better. In Europe, school names matter a lot in the design community to get recognition and a chance to have a decent design job.

But none of this stopped me, I didn’t give up, I pushed myself even more to be different and original to make it. I attended diverse “smaller” schools to build my skills and got accepted to one of the best animation schools in the world, Gobelins, the school of image.

Fast forward, my career jumped from advertising to a gaming company, a creative studio, an interactive agency, a digital studio, and finally Squarespace, a product company. Diversity helped me a lot and today, I’m happy with my position and I’m proud to also have a lot of career opportunities coming from different renowned places like Apple, Google, Netflix, Nike, Square, and more!

Alright, so let’s switch gears a bit and talk business. What should we know about your work?
I’m a Staff Product Designer at Squarespace. My team is a creatively driven collaborative team that sits between product and marketing. Our goal is to actively research, investigate, and prototype how we can propel our current platform with upcoming products while examining how burgeoning technology and thinking can help us.

I’m a multidisciplinary designer. If I had to describe myself, I’m primarily an Interaction Designer doing digital illustrations, mostly in 3D, trying to merge those two worlds together to create singular and unique work.

What is setting me apart from others is my deep understanding of systems and my learning curve. I embrace challenges and I’m not afraid of learning new software in a short amount of time to solve design issues. I love learning and this is truly one of my strongest skills.

Before we go, is there anything else you can share with us?
For people reading, I want to share one of the best pieces of advice that I received from a friend: “Just keep feeding your interest and grow, and don’t settle for anything less than an environment that allows you to do just that…”

I also recently launched a collection of 3D cartoon hands available on the Figma Community. The project is free to use and inclusive. You will have access to different skin tones to create a hand design with variants. You can also use some of those hands with GIPHY if you search for “fdgr” in the search bar.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.filsdegraphiste.fr
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/filsdegraphiste/
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/filsdegraphiste