Dominic McMahon

What's your role here at Pretty?

Where did it all start?

“Well, I always wanted to do something art and design related. At school I was the scruffy kid drawing and taking pictures and I grew up with an interest in how things looked and how things worked - so it was there from the start."

"But it was only after school when I took an art foundation course that it started to take shape. I did that foundation year and then took a gap year working and travelling before going to Goldsmiths College in London - one of the top art schools in the country - where I studied design."

"Did you learn anything in that first year that has helped you at Pretty?"

“Yes. On St Patricks Day of my first year I broke my knee. It took 6 months to fix, and once it was, I headed off to work on travelling carnivals in California for the summer. I earned a lot of cash and learnt a huge amount about human nature - the way people make decisions and buy things. At the end of the summer I came back to London with several thousand dollars - mostly in one dollar bills! I spent most of it on my first Mac computer.”

“At the end of the summer I came back to London with several thousand dollars - mostly in one dollar bills!”

"Had you used one before?"

“No, so I spent the next couple of years teaching myself how to use a computer. I used Pine email, Hypercard, HTML and browsers like Netscape. I learnt Photoshop, Freehand and Quark. I moved stuff on zip and floppy disks. It was quite handy because not only did I design the college magazine (Smiths) in the style of David Carson but I also designed the first student union website and learnt how to set up a server for it. I ended up teaching the BA journalism students about HTML and the web because people just didn’t know about it.”

What did you do before Pretty?

“My girlfriend was Danish so after I graduated we moved to Copenhagen and I got a job as an Assistant Art Director at an ad agency there. I spent a year making Danish adverts that ran in newspapers, billboards and even the odd TV spot."

"I also created a bunch of websites and animations. After year in Copenhagen, and 6 months in Cape Town while my girlfriend was conducting fieldwork for her MA, we returned to London where I ended up working at a large Brand Communications agency leading large digital projects for big brands.”

"Here I worked on converting the National Health Service brand guidelines into a digital world. The standard NHS guidelines had to deal with communicating clearly to everyone whoever they were and so in a world of ‘Flash’ sites we were among the pioneers in working with promoting accessibility. Designing sites that degraded gracefully - allowing everyone, whoever they were and however they accessed the web to find information.”

When did you & Toby start working together?

“Toby and I created graphics for video documentaries and video art. Some of it ended up being shown in the Museum of Modern Art in Vienna and we started working under the name of ‘Pretty, You May Be…’ I was also working freelance at the time for a Jeans company creating labelling, website and adverts.”

"How did you start Pretty?"

“Yeah, in 2002 Toby and I decided to put into action and idea we’d always talked about. We decided to quit our jobs and set up our own design company. We got 2 desks in Clink Street Studios near Borough Market and brought in our own computers and we were up and running. We spent our first weekend solidly working. That’s how Pretty started.”

“We got 2 desks in Clink Street Studios near Borough Market and we were up and running. That’s how Pretty started.”

Lastly tell us something about you that people don’t know

“Last year I mountain biked from Lands End to John O’Groats, mostly off road. Oh and I have a half finished video...”

See also