Lizzie Campbell
Q What do you do?
“I design holistic, authentic branding + websites for female-founded lifestyle + interior brands.”
Q What steps did you take to get to where you are now?
In 2013, I was a freshman in college and feeling creatively unfulfilled. One night on a whim, I decided to start a lifestyle blog on Blogspot. That turned into a self-taught passion for all things branding, design, social media, and marketing and helped land my first few freelance clients.
When I graduated college with a degree in Journalism, I landed a full-time marketing job at my university. I loved it and the people that I worked with, but I kept freelancing on the side and that led to what I thought would be my dream job working as a social media manager for an interior design studio in Chicago. Instead, it ended up being a toxic, draining nightmare job – but it gave me the push I needed to pursue running my business full time.
In October 2018, I quit the soul-sucking day job and focused on serving brand + web design clients, and I haven't looked back since. Over the past few years, I've had the privilege to collaborate with hundreds of women-owned businesses and help them grow their brands.
Q How do you stand out in your field?
As much as I love a good trend (and am definitely guilty of following them from time to time), I think it's incredibly important to think about a brand's design holistically and authentically. You want to strike the balance between trend-forward and relevant but still classic, sophisticated, and timeless. That's what I've been really focusing on lately.
Q What are you working on right now?
Expanding the team and honing in on serving our ultimate dream clients.
Q What’s your style?
Something that I hear my clients say a lot is "we want it to be high-end and luxurious but also fun!" And I've come to realize that statement really sums up my style and taste. As I've grown and evolved as a designer, my style has naturally matured, but I still love a fun, retro-inspired typeface or a bold palette with unexpected pops of color. Luxury doesn't have to mean boring!
Q Out of all your slashies, which one do you wish you could do more often?
I would love to continue honing my photography skills. Ever since becoming a little too obsessed with Instagram a few years ago, I've been very fascinated by lifestyle and editorial photography. I love to take my own photos, and I would love to one day soon offer branding photography for my clients.
Q What is frustrating you right now?
I haven't been able to carve out time lately to work on my own business - things like writing blog posts and email newsletters, creating and sharing content on social media, and other networking things. By the end of the work day, I'm so sick of looking at my computer screen that the last thing I want to do is settle in for several more hours in front of it. I think it's time to start outsourcing!
Q If you could hire someone for $20/hour, what would you have them do to make your day easier?
I need someone to help with project management - someone who can plan out timelines for my projects and tell me what I need to start working on when so that everyone stays happy and nothing gets forgotten or pushed way back. Or, someone to just do all the admin-type stuff, like formatting blog posts and newsletters, posting to social media, etc.
Q What do you wish you could have told yourself, when, and why?
I'd love the chance to go back and talk to myself during my first couple of years of college. I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life (at the time, I didn't even know my current career existed) and I was so stressed, broke, and burnt out. I'd love to go back in time, sit my 19-year-old self down, and explain that, while the next several years will be a bit rocky, I'll eventually have a job where I get to be creative every single day on my own terms, and won't actually be a starving artist like society has led me to believe.
Q If you could talk to an expert to gain more insight on something, what would it be about?
I would love someone to tell me how the heck some people have exploded their businesses on TikTok. My feed is still just full of teenagers dancing and pointing. Now I feel old!
Q What kind of opportunities/projects are you looking for?
Branding, web design, packaging, and brand strategy.
Q Describe your ideal job/client/collaboration.
I love working with female-owned lifestyle and interior brands. If it's something that makes your home or life more beautiful, I'm all in. And I think graphic design and interior design is such a fun and natural collaboration that it makes for some really fantastic projects.
Q: What is your rate?
Custom branding projects start at $5,000. Branding + web starts at $8,000. But we pride ourselves on flexibility and offer a wide range of solutions at all budgets and business levels.
We provide starting prices to help you gauge whether we’d be a good fit for your budget and timeline. But since every brand and project is unique, we can’t give you every possible detail below.
We’ll hop on a (free) discovery call to discuss your vision, goals, and dreams for your business and put together custom packages at different price points that will allow you to choose the one that best fits your budget and goals.
Q How should someone approach you about working together?
Fill out the form on my website.
Q Who is a creative you admire?
Rache from Squarestylist is one of the most creative, hard-working, and intelligent people in the game! I seriously can't thank her enough for how much she's helped me uplevel my website design game.
Q Oh! and… how do you stay creative?
Surround myself with other creative women.
This member profile was originally published in March 2022.