Kin's Rotate Fest: Two Days in Aberdeen with the Next Generation of Creatives
Nicola Watson opening Rotate Fest
"I wish there were something like this when I was in my messy middle."
That was a common phrase amongst my fellow mentors at Kin's inaugural Rotate Fest.
It was very true.
A couple of days of creating with a small team, helped and critiqued by industry professionals, topped off with outstanding talks and a live music event where the collective work became part of the visuals, would've been the holistic creative tonic that would have helped my early, fragile confidence so much.
Making good connections. Having fun with a brief that had no limits on direction. Being allowed to follow an idea and see where it led.
Total tonic.
What is Rotate Fest?
For anyone who wasn't there, Rotate Fest was a brand-new design festival run by Kin, an Aberdeen charity that supports emerging creatives and helps them build lasting creative futures in Aberdeen, the shire, and beyond.
The two-day live project took place at The Tunnels on 16 and 17 September. Small teams of creatives were given the space to build entire visual worlds from scratch, with support from industry mentors.
The project then continued on 24 September, when the work was shaped into visuals projected behind Fred Deakin's DJ set.
It was open to creatives at any stage and from any discipline. That was one of the things I liked most about it. You didn't have to arrive with a polished portfolio or a perfectly formed career plan. You just had to be interested in making something and willing to work with other people.
That kind of openness matters.
Creative careers can feel quite solitary, especially when you're starting out. You can spend a lot of time wondering whether you're doing things properly, whether your work is good enough and whether everyone else has somehow received a handbook that you missed.
Rotate Fest gave people a reason to get in a room together and make something without needing to know exactly where it was going.
Getting messy with creative signs.
A proper creative tonic
Rob Johnson in full flow
The festival also included talks from two brilliant guests.
Rob Johnson is a motion designer originally from Stonehaven, with more than 20 years of experience across advertising, animation and illustration. He was also the illustrator of the traffic cone that travelled to Boston with the Tartan Army, a brilliant piece of North East creative folklore in its own right.
Fred Deakin needs little introduction to anyone who has spent time around electronic music, design or both. He's one half of Lemon Jelly, a Mercury Prize and Brit Award-nominated act, and co-founded the award-winning design agency Airside. For Rotate Fest, he was back behind the decks, bringing the project to life in a completely different setting.
Fred Deakin answering questions, mostly Jelly-based.
The combination was excellent.
There was insight into creative careers, an honest discussion about the process, a chance to meet people working across different disciplines, and an opportunity to see the work become part of a live experience.
That last part felt particularly special.
It wasn't a case of making something, pinning it to a wall and moving on. The work had somewhere else to go. It became part of the night's atmosphere. A room full of new ideas was transformed into a moving, shared visual experience behind Fred's set.
That's a powerful thing to give someone early in their creative life.
ABZ Away days
I loved sneaking into the city for a few days.
I'm based in Aboyne, Aberdeenshire, and only moved to the North East recently. So being able to head into Aberdeen and spend time with this group felt like a lovely way to get to know the place.
The Tunnels was a brilliant venue for it. Literally underground, with all the atmosphere that brings, it felt like the right setting for a project built around experimentation. There was a sense that anything could happen, which is exactly what you want from a creative brief.
I was there to mentor one of the teams. My guidance was subtle because their ideas were excellent. I didn't need to arrive with a masterplan or tell them what to make.
Mostly, I just had to steer them towards the deadline and make sure they didn't completely get lost in their creativity.
That is sometimes the job.
When a group is full of ideas, the challenge isn't always generating more. It can be deciding what to keep, what to develop and when to stop exploring long enough to make something real.
Nell and Hayden from Team 1 present their final piece
Team 1
Big up Team 1, who aced it and survived my over-enthusiastic cheerleading: Nell, Hayden and Leo.
What stood out was the energy between them. They were happy to throw ideas around, build on one another's thinking and keep moving when things inevitably shifted.
Rather than arriving with one fixed answer, they let the project develop through conversation and making. You could see the work finding its shape as they responded to each other's instincts.
That kind of collaboration is easy to talk about and harder to practise
My role was mainly to keep the clock visible and the level of encouragement high.
The encouragement levels may have been a little too high.
But they got there.
The project continued beyond the workshop, becoming part of the visuals for Fred Deakin's closing-night DJ set.
Final animations produced by scanclub.studio
Why this kind of thing matters
Looking back, I can see how useful something like Rotate Fest would have been when I was starting out.
Not because it would have solved everything. Nothing does that. Creative confidence is usually built slowly, through a mixture of making things, getting things wrong, finding people who understand, and realising that uncertainty is not evidence that you shouldn't be there.
But being surrounded by people who are also figuring things out would have helped.
So would having a brief with no obvious commercial answer. No client presentation. No invoice. No need to explain the return on investment before you had even made the first sketch.
Just time, people and the chance to follow an idea.
Those opportunities can be hard to find. They are especially important in places where creative communities are still building their visibility and connections. Aberdeen has plenty of talented people working across design, illustration, music, photography, motion, fashion and other disciplines. Bringing those people together creates the possibility of new conversations and collaborations.
That's the value of a healthy design community in Aberdeen. It gives people somewhere to meet before they know exactly what they might do together.
Since moving to the area, I've been lucky enough to come across more of that creative energy than I expected. From local events to conversations with designers and artists, there's a real appetite for creative networking across North East Scotland.
Arriving in the North East just as Kin was kicking this off has been a genuine stroke of luck.
It was meant to be.
A massive thank you
Massive big up to the Kin Krew. This was a superb debut for the festival, and I was delighted to be involved.
Kin is doing valuable work for Aberdeen's creative community by creating opportunities for people to meet, learn, experiment and build connections. I hope this is the first of many projects that give local creatives the time and confidence to try something new.
Look out for what Kin does next.
Big thanks to Nell, Hayden and Leo for being such a brilliant team and for putting up with my enthusiastic cheerleading.
And special thanks, because she never thanks herself in the big list of closing credits: Nicola Watson is a legend.
Nicola is the person behind Kin and the driving force who made Rotate Fest happen. Projects like this don't appear by accident. They need someone willing to make the introductions, find the resources, keep pushing through the practical details and believe that the creative community is worth investing in.
Rotate Fest was a reminder that creative communities grow when people make room for one another.
If you're a designer, illustrator, photographer, musician, animator or maker anywhere in the Northeast, get involved where you can. Go to the events. Start the conversation. Share a bit of knowledge. Offer encouragement to someone earlier in their journey.
You don't need to have all the answers.
Sometimes showing up is enough to help someone else feel that they belong.
I'm looking forward to seeing what comes next for Kin, and to finding more ways for Wiselove Studio to be part of the creative community around Aberdeen and Aberdeenshire.
It was meant to be.
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