Holly Gardner
Holly graduated with a BA in Film & Media Production in 2014 and later went on to do a post-graduate degree in Brand & Communications at Red and Yellow. She is passionate about people and strategic marketing. She loves creating exceptional designs that make for engaging digital experiences. She is also very passionate about rebrands – she loves the process of "cleaning up" a brand and moving it into a new, more renovated space. She loves ensuring a brand is cohesive in both the core strategy/values/messaging and design. She says, “it's a major challenge, but I love it”.
She is currently permanently employed as the Brand and Marketing Executive at Travers Smith LLP based in central London. When she graduated from UCT, she did a post-graduate degree in marketing in Cape Town. She then moved across to London in January 2016. She had always intended to embark on a career in fashion so naturally she found myself at a fashion company.
Her experience at the fashion company was both sweet and sour. She discovered that fashion wasn't the career route she wanted to pursue, but it was here that she got her first taste for rebrands, digital design and e-commerce. Shortly after, she got offered a position at a Law Firm in central London and she has been in law (specifically, legal marketing) ever since.
Earlier this year, she was flown to Cannes to manage a company event which was her biggest highlight - both in planning and attending.
Having completed a double major in both Film and Media Production, she has no doubt that her degree gave her the knack for grappling with topics - for getting to the crux of an issue and unravelling key issues / motifs. She says, “at UCT, the quality of essays (and work in general) was truly exceptional! That has been immeasurably useful to me now, as I am often in situations where I need to get a point across effectively and succinctly”.
She also mentions that learning to code in the Media Production course definitely has helped her with website development now. She states that, “I am able to think logically about not only the user journey but also the back end system. Media Production also taught me how to use Photoshop, which I use almost every day - that has been a massive asset in my career to date.”
Holly recalls her fondest memories at the department was “the part where we all had to create a piece of journalism on something we were passionate about. It was great to see everyone's passions come to life”