Owen Oxley

Early life

I was born in Derbyshire in 1981 and was raised in a most creative environment, my Father being a world class joiner and my Mum a keen actress I was always encouraged that anything is possible.

Like many creatives I didn't find school & college the easiest, very much 'Round Peg Square Hole' situation but no matter where I found myself I'd always work a way to ensure that design played a big part. This could've been at Thorntons Chocolates where I should have been making Easter Eggs but I was infact making lifesize Christmas displays with scrap cardboard or at Egg Banking PLC where I managed to find myself heading an internal project to signpost internal departments and areas saving the company approximately £50K.

Actually being a real designer

It was at this time at Egg Banking PLC that I landed my first actual official creative job, A content Manager, part of the team responsible for egg.com. This really helped me fine tune and broaden my design skills, Egg had an internal agency full of the best graphic designers with years of experience in every different design remit, luckily for me they all took me under their wings and mentored me for the last few years that Egg was running.

Redundancy & New Beginnings

Following 10 years at Egg I was made redundant in 2011, at this time I already had a 3 year old Daughter and my Wife was pregnant with our second, It was a really scary time, but as always my Wife had my back 100% and encouraged me to be a self employed designer.

Real Design Training with an Adobe Expert

Part of our redundacy package at Egg was for re-training, with my colleagues from the internal agency we booked Adobe Illustrator, Photoshop, Dreamweaver & InDesign courses in Sheffield with Adobe Jedi Gary Bradley. This was incredible and really helped towards the imposter syndrome that had developed over the years and this was the new start I needed.

One of the main things that I needed to learn was the actual make up of graphics for different purposes. Most people have heard of files like jpg or png and these are basically fixed images that can only be made smaller without losing quality. It wasn't long into this new career that I learned the term 'Vector'

A vector graphic is a digital image built from mathematical equations defining points, lines, curves, and shapes, allowing it to scale infinitely without losing quality, unlike pixel-based raster images (like JPGs). This scalability makes vectors ideal for logos, icons, and illustrations that need to appear sharp on everything from a business card to a large billboard, with common formats including SVG, AI, and EPS.

Armed with this I dedicated my time to understand everything I needed to know to create really versitile Branding Documents and logos that could be used for any needs in design.

Fight for your spot

I've always found that I've been lucky when it comes to meeting people and making the most of opportunities. This next chapter is the fresh start of my new career. I was introduced to Wayne Kirk at 4th Dimension MMA and he quickly became a really close friend and mentor.

Mixed Martial Arts have always been a big part of my life and now having an office inside Waynes Gym meant that I was living out a dream being in the Fight world and also contributing to it by making Fight Gear and websites for some of the UK's biggest names.

Meeting the Fashion World head on

It was during the early months of Elevator Studio that I was introduced to Dhillan Bhardwaj, at the time Dhillan was 15 and still at school but had a dream of wanting a brand in the fashion world. After sitting with Dhillan I drew the original Ratchet Clothing Logo and first Website and Webstore.

Ratchet Clothing then became a big part of my life, it was family ran and I was welcomed into the family where I was the Creative Director for 5 years, in this time we had shops in Nottingham, Essex, Newcastle, Birmingham, & Sheffield. We designed clothes for the likes of Rihanna & Miley Cyrus, and Dhillan got invited for tea with the Prime Minister. He is now famous for making a million at 16.

Outlaws & Underdogs

During my time at Waynes Gym in the early days of Elevator Studio one of the fighters I was fortuante enough to meet was Dan 'The Outlaw' Hardy. Dan was fighting in the UFC and I was responsible for his website, fight kit & merch from when we first connected.

With only a year between us and we had a lot of really similar experiences growing up and our love of MMA just brought us closer together. So when Full Reptile Collective was being created I naturally filled the Creative Director position working with Dan on the lifestyle brand including all clothing & merch, Podcasts & collaborations.

Time flys

From the nerve racking start of Elevator Studio with a toddler running around and a baby on the way to now with more than 13 years experience learning everything there is to know about branding, logos, vectors, cut & sew CADS & opening retail stores I feel that I have a lot to offer. No matter how small your enquiry or need if I can help guide you through the overly complicated world of design for what you want/need please get in touch.

Thanks for reading & I look forward to hearing from you.