What It Means To Me

Combining My Passions

For as long as I can remember, I have been in love with the game of hockey. Growing up in a family with parents who met while working for a hockey team and named both of their kids after hockey players (shoutout Kjell Samuelsson), it isn’t very hard to see why I fell in love with the sport. I started skating when I was just a couple years old and was playing hockey as soon as I was old enough. I eventually fell in love with goaltending and decided to become a goalie. I loved looking at the masks of NHL and college goalies I idolized and I eventually tried my hand at creating my own designs. Little did I know this would be the start of my second passion, design. I instantly became addicted to creating mask designs and before I knew it I was teaching myself how to use Photoshop and Illustrator. I eventually came up with the general idea of an adult amateur hockey league throughout Minnesota, almost like an extension of high school hockey. This idea grew into what is now the #MAHL, a fictional brainchild of mine that combines my two biggest passions into one big thing.

Younger me playing youth hockey

Practice Makes Progress

One of the best things about running the #MAHL is that it forces me to constantly practice my craft. I can tangibly see the improvements I have made as a designer from the start of the MAHL to now. I can’t wait to get up to the 2010’s and beyond so I can really begin to push the designs of the league into the modern era. It has been a challenge to try and match my designs to the time period they are implemented, like making a logo intentionally “bad” so that I can come back and update it at a later date. Forcing myself to update my own logos and pushing myself outside of my comfort zone have helped me develop new techniques and skills. I am nowhere near perfect when it comes to designing, but I am confident in saying that working on this project for the past 5+ years has drastically improved my abilities as a graphic designer. The #MAHL has been by far the biggest project I have ever taken on, but it is also by far my favorite. When I drive through these towns I think about what their team would be if this all was real and it is something that I am really excited to keep working on for years to come.

My first ever mask design, circa 2011

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