A Day in Chicago with Pinterest's Christyna Conway
Formally trained as an architect, Christyna Conway is a Designer at Pinterest, where she supports the Global Creative Strategy team. In her role she is responsible for designing ads and scaled materials for some of Pinterest’s top advertisers, while providing direction for visual communication strategies. Along with her day job, she dedicates her extra time towards leading creative for Blackboard, an employee resource group supporting the Black community at Pinterest. Christyna’s motivations speak through intentional creative and understanding how design can impact human interaction.
6:30am: I wish I had one of those “five-to-nine” routines before your “nine-to-five”, but I haven’t mastered that kind of productivity just yet. My day usually starts with a morning meditation and yoga in bed. I try to spend the first hour or so of my day with no technology, sometimes with a book, or music. I’m currently reading Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell and Cleo Sol and Sade are my go-to’s in the morning.
7:00am: Typically my seventeen-year-old shih tzu, Dominoe, is up by this time so the next hour of my morning routine is dedicated to getting him walked and fed. Next on the list is getting my sixteen ounce iced latte from my favorite coffee shop in the West Loop, Ground Up, along with my favorite snack, blueberries, next to my laptop and monitor.
8:00am: Twice a week I take French lessons with Verbling. My instructor Melanie, is from France, but currently based in Greece. These lessons usually start between eight or nine in the morning and are the most exciting way to really get a start to my day. I also feel like I’m activating one of those muscles in my brain that rarely gets used in my day-to-day. Depending on the day I may also be on Slack at this point, checking to see if anything urgent is floating in my inbox. Because I work on a Global team, my hours tend to be pretty flexible. Sometimes I may have to work super early, and sometimes super late. It ebbs and flows! This makes working from home super convenient.
10:30am: By mid-morning I like to get a list of tasks for the day in order and review any designs that might be shipped later in the day. This typically includes exploring different layouts, colors, and photography that could be a better fit for the design that I’ve been working on. If no changes are necessary, I’ll get ready for my meetings for the day, which typically take place in the afternoon.
12:00pm: Meeting time! It’s rare that I have a day without meetings. From around noon through the early-evening I’ll typically be in meetings or will set time for designing. This could include anything from mood-boarding for design inspiration — which means making some super bomb Pinterest boards — to collaborating with other designers and writers on a scaled creative resource for our sellers and advertisers. On Pinterest, ads are actually considered important content for people who are looking for shopping inspiration from brands.
Recently, my schedule has been pretty busy, since we just recently launched one of the most beautiful campaigns I’ve worked on to date, “Find Your Routes” to honor the history of Black travel in America. By connecting the past, present and future of Black travel, this campaign pays homage to the historical Negro Motorist Green Book through it’s visual identity. Through the voices of our elders, we wanted to tell the story of our own travel experiences over the years to inspire the next destination. I had the privilege to lead design for this year's company wide BHM brand identity and co-direct our video spot (narrated by my own grandmother, Blanche Conway).
6:00pm: After a long day of using my creative muscles, I like to do something that requires very little brain power to wind down. My background is in architecture, so looking at architecture in magazines and listening to architects talk about their work is one of my favorite ways to reground and center myself with inspiration. I love watching The Local Project on YouTube to hear a calming voice and see some beautiful designs. These moments could also include anything from going on a walk or a run in my neighborhood, having a FaceTime date with one of my best friends, Gia, or cooking a usually delicious meal. You could only imagine how many recipes I have on my Pinterest board that I have yet to try… but I’ve made it a goal of mine to try to cook more and order less.
7:30pm: After eating dinner, I’ll call my mom while checking Slack and my emails again just in case something important comes through that I should be on top of prior to the next day beginning. I’ll then revisit my checklist for the day to feel a sense of accomplishment after getting through most (if not all) of my tasks. If I don’t discover anything super pressing in my inbox, at this point I’ll work on some of the side projects while sipping on some kombucha. One of those projects being Listen to the Architects, a community founded to support and empower the voices of young Black students studying art, architecture, or design related fields. Another project is the never ending interior design of my loft…this could be anything from checking Facebook Marketplace for a rare piece of furniture or painting another canvas for one of the walls.
10:30pm: By now, I’m officially unplugged from my work, reflecting on the day, and doing some sort of stretch to get ready for bed. Eventually I work my way from my couch and TV, to my bed, and drift off to sleep.