Once Upon A Time in DJCAD - Zoe Sadler's alumni story

Self-confessed to be “cursed with a problematic book obsession”, Zoe has come a long way in her creative journey to becoming a successful member of our alumni community living in the picturesque Isle of Wight. But once upon a time, the author with Aberdeen roots was an aspiring Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art & Design (DJCAD) student arriving in Dundee for the first time to start on her path to innovative, inky illustrator. Zoe sat down with Alumni Engagement Coordinator, Craig Reoch, to discuss her journey from art school to now.

“I’m from Aberdeen originally, but my teacher kind of pushed me to go towards Dundee. It was also in the middle between Aberdeen and other cities like Glasgow and Edinburgh. And when I went and visited, I just loved it, so I was more than happy to come to Dundee!”

DJCAD specifically was a great place to be a student. Being able to bounce around all the different departments and studios within the one building was useful as an aspiring illustrator. Zoe explained:

“The best thing was doing the General Foundation first year as you got to try everything out! In fact, it was so hard to choose what I wanted to do!”.

It wasn’t long before Zoe had zoned in on the sort of route down which she wanted to go. Her love of stories, fairy tales, magic and whimsy growing up inspired her to illustrate designs around these main themes.

“I think I have always had an interest in books so that was always the direction I wanted to go down. When I first came to uni, I wanted to do Fine Art, but I felt Illustration was more in the middle for what I was interested in. I did a lot of projects on fairy tales and when I think back on it, I think a lot of it was really geared towards being in books and you could see it translating well to books.”

After graduating, Zoe took some time to think about her next steps. She wasn’t initially sure where she wanted to go but had faith in her ideas and ambition.

“I got a bit stuck for a while, as you do, as it was so competitive. I didn’t have a lot of industry experience either, so I actually applied to the University of Plymouth and did a postgrad in Publishing.”

Around this time, Zoe was given the opportunity to undertake a work placement at a children’s book publisher’s in London, which taught her a lot. Living in London, however, was not ideal for Zoe as she prefers a quieter atmosphere away from the hustle and bustle of busy city life. Despite this, she got offered an illustrator position for a different, smaller children’s book publisher in London, but which allowed her to work from Plymouth:

“I would visit London once a month and they would give me my briefs. I was then able to then work on their book list, so that was great. A couple of years later I started freelancing as I had a bit more experience and was able to build things up myself!”

Zoe put her experience and her love of stories to good use when she decided to write her own book. She explained that when she was in Plymouth, she loved the lighthouse on the Hoe called Smeaton’s Tower.

“I’d draw it over and over again to the point where it must have been ingrained in my brain for about four years straight! Eventually I decided to write a book about it – it is about a lighthouse keeper who isn’t necessarily very good at his job.”

The story details how boats keep crashing into the lighthouse, but no one really knows why, and it developed into a children’s picture book tale with it’s quirky humour appealing to those of all ages. Zoe loves putting pen to paper and also hand drawing everything she does, so this was the perfect project for her. As she had produced it on her own, she didn’t know at the time how she was going to fund the printing, so Zoe launched a Kickstarter appeal to crowdfund.

“That was way back in the early days before people really used those sorts of platforms, so I think I was one of the first people in the area to really do it. It was quite exciting – I originally asked for just over £4,000 to fund the book and I actually got about £7,000!”

Zoe then printed the book and it turned out it was a great success. Later, she wrote a second book (which she funded on her own) Chasing Butterflies which reminds us all to live in the moment and enjoy the experiences which come our way. Zoe explained she is looking to pursue further projects with publishers in the future.

With the success of her books, Zoe continued to use her love of illustration, stories and fairy tales to embark on a new, exciting endeavour. Zoe next collaborated with popular puzzle company Ravensburger to develop some fantastic jigsaw puzzles based off her unique, mystical designs.

“I had been producing a lot of work for other people by this stage and I just wanted to draw something for myself. It was all my favourite things I love doing – magical, ‘witch-y’ stuff, potion bottles and that sort of thing.”

Zoe had drawn up her designs knowing that she wanted to submit them but didn’t originally know how to go about doing so. She knew she wanted to work with Ravensburger as she had some of their puzzles herself and loved them.

“I couldn’t find any way to submit content to them online, so I actually sent them a Facebook message!” Zoe laughed. “But they picked up on it! They passed it on to the puzzle team and within a few weeks they had got back to me and said they’d take it!”

The design turned into a really detailed, 2,000-piece puzzle which Zoe says has been her favourite thing to work on so far.

She has released two puzzles with Ravensburger over the past couple of years and has another two due out in 2022. 

Zoe remembers her time spent at the University of Dundee very fondly. She remarked that the connections she made, and the excellent social life offered in Dundee were some of her key highlights:

“My favourite thing is definitely my circle of friends that I had! I made some amazing friends; we went out and had fun all the time. We keep in touch; I’m actually coming up in July to meet up with some of them. We have mini reunions all the time and always get together for celebrations and things like that.”

The future is looking brighter still for Zoe. As she was working for quite young age groups initially, she would now like to up the age range a little bit and write for a slightly older group. Zoe explained:

“I’m actually writing my first novel! It’s an expansion on the original lighthouse story. I’m now going into that world a bit more and I’m planning on writing a trilogy about it. It’s a little darker and quite spooky but it explains a lot more about the lighthouse story!”

Zoe wishes to acknowledge her connection to Scotland in these new stories, and they will have an underlying theme of Scottish fairy tales – something we are very excited about at the University of Dundee!

Despite being unsure and having uncertainties about the direction she wanted to go in, Zoe is a testament to how hard work, perseverance and following something you are genuinely passionate about can lead to great success.

“If you’re like me and you have been to art school and want to find success you have got to be persistent. Just think outside the box and be creative. Work on things that maybe someone hasn’t done before or something that already exists that you think you could improve. Keep trying – I could have given up and got so frustrated and I’m so glad I didn’t. Something amazing will happen at some point and you’ll feel really happy that you kept going”.