Annika Olson
Self-portrait by Annika Olson: acrylic painting of her in dark sunglasses making a hand sign, against a teal background scattered with hearts
Industrial Design · Portfolio

Annika Olson

I'm a maker before I'm anything else. I like solving problems through art, design and making — spatial design, ceramics, sketching, photography and invention — and I'm heading into Western Washington University's Industrial Design pathway.

More about me

Featured project · 01

A Place of My Own

A whole house, designed room by room — and built as a 3D environment you can actually move the camera through.

Step inside
Living room render with warm wood floors, a low sofa and a large abstract painting
The blurb still needs Annika's edit. Every phrase in it is lifted from her earlier site, so nothing is invented — but it's a recombination rather than something she sat down and wrote. Two alternatives are in the project notes.
Process

The unfinished version is the interesting one.

Sketches, cardboard rigs and the parts that didn't work sit next to the finished objects rather than behind them.

How I work

Sketch to be added

01 Sketch

Early desk organizer model made from corrugated cardboard and blue painter's tape

02 Cardboard

Refined desk organizer model made from white foam core with multiple compartments

03 Foam core

Selected work

A selection of projects across materials and methods. See all six →

Tote bag made from hundreds of interlinked aluminium can pull-tabs with a braided fabric handle

Chainmail Tote

02 · Material study
Pink fabric strap system with metal clips designed for one-handed zipper use

One-Handed Zipper Pull

03 · Accessibility design
Wall-mounted foam-core organizer holding a keyboard, phone and headphones

Wall Organizer

04 · Product design
Modular black desk organizer holding craft tools, beads, yarn and fabric

Desk Organizer

05 · Upcycled product design
Blue and yellow ceramic chip-and-dip bowl served with tortilla chips and dip

Chip & Dip Bowl

06 · Ceramics
Supporting work

Drawing & Observation

Studies in form, proportion, perspective and visual storytelling — the drawing practice behind how I observe and communicate ideas.

View all drawings
Coloured pencil study of a green bell pepper with a cast shadow, drawn inside a ruled border
Pepper study — observation
Charcoal drawing of a human skull at an angle with dramatic light and shadow
Skull — charcoal
Ink drawing titled Murky showing a figure at the end of a rain-streaked one-point perspective street
Murky — perspective