Loving to be up early with the sun and a strong cup of coffee is one of the many things about Cienna Knights that makes her so great – unless you’re her roommate and you like to sleep in late.. But that’s beside the point! Onto the relevant information!

 

A recent University of Chester graduate with a BA in graphic design and a MA in design. Her favorite hobbies include: traveling, reading, crocheting and knitting, reading, drawing and painting, writing very bad poetry, reading, gardening, and… did I mention reading? Cienna often has to take great pauses between books because she knows it is far too easy for her to get lost in imaginary and fantastical worlds. 

 

After high school, she moved from little ol’ Daleville, Indiana to Chester, England to study graphic design at the University of Chester. After three years of studying design, and having several breakdowns over her computer, she made the decision to continue her latest topic of research in a Master’s degree. Cienna got to spend another year at the University of Chester, and was very grateful for that extra year with her British friends, university lecturers and technicians. Now she says things like “proper,” and “ace,” and “do you reckon,” and “tills” instead of “register.” 

 

What was that topic she wanted so badly to continue researching at a higher degree level? Mixed-race and minority representation in design channels. You see, Cienna grew up in a multiracial family with her Jamaican mother and white American father. At that her mixedness had been a constant in her identity, and she hadn’t seen others who looked like her represented through media and design. She felt that it was an important topic for her to research.

 

For a little over two years Cienna researched mixed-race representation, or lack thereof, in certain design channels. She found ways to: express her experiences to others, to help non-mixed people even slightly understand what it could mean to be mixed-race, and how to help other creatives accurately represent mixed-race and minority characters in their work.

 

Towards the end of her Master’s degree, the Covid-19 pandemic hit. And then George Floyd was killed and the Black Lives Matter protests happened, and she felt that her work was that much more important. Cienna aimed to make her research help not just mixed-race individuals but all minorities. 

 

She plans to get her PhD at some point in the future, to continue her research further and aid in the way that design channels accurately represent all minorities. But before she can embark on something that big she wants to grow her skills, get a job as a Junior Designer, maybe get she Master’s project published.