I’m a designer and art director drawn to illustration, colour, form and moving images. I enjoy making things and working with people who bring a different perspective.
My 12 years in party products took me from hands-on design to Art Director at PartyDeco. I’ve designed products, shaped collections and guided designers and external illustrators, working with sales, purchasing, R&D and factories in China and Poland.
I bring that experience to new ideas, materials and collaborations — with curiosity about what we could make next.
Also part of my experience.
Market & trend research
Turning trade-fair observations, retail insights and customer feedback into recommendations for new products, materials and collection directions.
Collection planning & presentations
Co-planning themes and product ranges with the Portfolio team, then preparing visual presentations of upcoming collections for the sales team.
Designer & illustrator direction
Selecting external creatives, writing briefs and guiding designers through reviews and refinements, from the initial idea to production artwork.
Licensed product development
Developing products for the company’s first licensing project, working with the licensor and adapting their supplied artwork.
Collaboration with factories in China
Factory visits and supplier discussions about materials, production possibilities and product quality, including colour consistency and sample feedback.
Product development & sample reviews
Refining forms and construction with technical teams, adapting designs for production and reviewing golden samples before manufacturing.
Packaging range redesign
Developing a consistent packaging concept across formats for a premium balloon range, balancing visual identity, material finishes and production costs.
Trade-fair stand collaboration
Contributing to the theme, colour palette, layout and product displays alongside Trade Marketing and the stand designer.
A conversation is a good beginning.
What’s onyour mind?
A rough idea is enough. Tell me what you’re thinking — we can work out the details together.
Projects, creative consultations and unexpected collaborations.
A new direction for a growing range. Market insights, product roles and creative briefs.
Range co-planningCreative directionDesign-to-production
Characters made for playPartyDeco / Collection photography
01 / The challenge
More than a list of new products.
The foil-balloon category needed a broader offer, while the internal design team was working on other priorities.
The task brought together market analysis, range planning and creative development. It needed a clear visual direction and a way of working across external designers and the in-house team.
The work addressed two complementary product roles: universal, retail-ready essentials, and distinctive shapes that could support occasions without requiring a dedicated full collection for every motif.
Audience.Character. Form.
02 / My decisions
A different character for a different audience.
I co-planned the offer with the Portfolio team, contributing product ideas informed by analysis. I defined the visual direction and considered how expressions, proportions and styling would relate to the audience — from younger children to older kids, with a broad appeal in mind.
I also selected formats: helium, air-filled, standing and wheeled products. These were product decisions as well as visual ones, connecting character with how a balloon would be used and made.
03 / Theme, form & use
The theme is just the beginning.
The next question is what a balloon can become: a sculptural volume, a vehicle, a character or part of a larger world.
With growing emphasis on products that do not need helium, air-filled formats became an important part of the range direction. The pumpkin and fire engine show how construction can give a familiar theme a different physical form.
Character development asks a different question: how does a hedgehog belong to a woodland family? Related licensed work adds another starting point — an established character and the licensor’s artwork.
01 / Air-filled · Volume
A theme with volume.
The pumpkin becomes a sculptural object. Its rounded segments and curled stem give a familiar seasonal motif a presence in the room, without helium.
02 / Air-filled · Construction
A vehicle that stands.
Inflatable wheels support the fire engine, while the ladder extends its silhouette. The illustration and the structure work together as one product.
03 / Balloon Station · Woodland family
A character that belongs.
The hedgehog is part of Balloon Station’s woodland animals. Expression, proportions and gentle graphic details give it personality within the family.
04 / Related licensed work · Gabby’s Dollhouse
A licensed world, in foil.
Working with the licensor and their supplied artwork to develop the character as a foil product. The combined forms offer a playful way to bring the licensed world into the room.
PartyDeco product photography, supplied by Joanna. Gabby’s Dollhouse uses licensed character artwork. Original product images, without AI alterations.
One theme. Different forms.Farm / expressive faces, a standing vehicle and a character with ribbon legs.A family beyond the motif.Space / a shared palette, metallic surfaces and distinct personalities.
PartyDeco products / AI-assisted portfolio compositions based on the supplied product imagery.
04 / From illustration to product
A drawing becomes something you can hold.
The train shows the passage from a flat illustration to an inflated, standing object.
The approved drawing and the finished product share the same graphic character: a tall chimney, hand-drawn spokes, rivets and an orange front. Inflation gives those shapes volume, while the foil surface changes how light and colour read.
01 / Approved direction
The illustration.
Original team artwork Extracted from the design-development board.
→
02 / Finished product
The balloon.
Standing foil balloon / FB463 Air-filled · 76 × 72 cm after inflation.
The drawn spokes, rivets and chimney carry the illustration’s personality into the product.
Form
Think beyond the outline.
The flat body becomes a rounded volume. Separate inflatable wheels give the train its standing format.
Material
Let the surface do its part.
Seams, reflections and soft shadows reveal what changes when an illustration becomes foil.
05 / The collaboration & reviews
Set the direction. Refine the details.
I independently sourced and recruited external designers, prepared creative briefs, reviewed their proposals and guided refinements. I personally designed selected products within the broader offer.
The working boards show how those conversations became specific decisions: testing quieter dinosaur colours, simplifying the race car’s graphics and checking how a silhouette could be manufactured.
Review focus / Graphic hierarchy
What can we take away?
The feedback explored removing the checkerboard or integrating it into the body, and considered a simpler red-and-silver direction.
Review focus / Colour & audience
Which palette fits the character?
The review asked for darker or more muted greens and explored a separate baby T-Rex direction for a younger audience.
Original team development artwork from the supplied review board. Exploration variants, not a chronological before-and-after sequence.
As work moved towards production, I supervised the in-house preparation of production artwork and modified selected designs to make them feasible to manufacture. One constraint recorded in the review was the need for the same cutting outline on both sides of a balloon to manage cost.
RANGE PLANNING — co-created with the Portfolio team. ILLUSTRATIONS — external designers and selected original work by Joanna. PRODUCTION ARTWORK — in-house team, under my design review. MY ROLE — visual direction, product decisions, talent selection, briefs, design reviews and selected product design.
06 / The result
A shared direction across the offer.
The project connected assortment decisions, design briefs, individual product development and production-artwork preparation. The train connects the process to a finished product; the family compositions show how different characters and formats can sit together.
The broader practice also works at the scale of future ranges: deciding what role a collection should play before developing its products.
The working plans are not a confirmed launch count. Original illustrations and product development were collaborative; the case does not attribute the entire range to one designer.
View more design-development referencesWorking design / team material. A coordinated theme across a character, shapes and graphics.Working variants / team design material. These are iterations, not a claimed before-and-after sequence of Joanna’s personal corrections.
Original characters and patterns. One illustrated world across a party collection.
Original collection designIllustration & patternLaunched products
Dino Fun / A world of charactersPartyDeco / Collection photography
01 / The challenge
A whole world, from one theme.
Design a dinosaur collection that works across a birthday table, decorations and playful accessories.
The idea needed to travel between very different objects: a printed plate, a folded box, a paper hat and a large foil balloon. The connection comes from character, colour and recognisable details, with room for each product to do something different.
Character. Pattern.A world to play in.
02 / My decisions
A pattern that tells the same story.
I designed the collection’s visual world, including the dinosaur characters and pattern. Forest green, mint and warm ochre connect the illustrations, while palms, volcanoes and small graphic details build the setting around them.
The pattern brings the characters together on the plates. Elsewhere, a single detail becomes the product: a row of spikes on a party hat, a dinosaur silhouette on a napkin, or a character wrapping around a gift bag.
Pattern / an illustrated world on a paper plate.In use / the same pattern across the table.
03 / Across the collection
One language. Many ways to use it.
I translated the theme into tableware, gift packaging, decorations and party accessories. Shapes and graphic details connect the range without turning every product into a repeat of the same illustration.
Paper forms bring the characters into the table setting. The foil balloons extend that world into the room; I created the original dinosaur designs and the idea and shapes for the dinosaur numbers, developed with the team.
01 / Gift packaging02 / Wearable play03 / Tabletop forms04 / Small details05 / Character silhouettes06 / Everyday objects, reimagined
Foil balloons and number concepts / original portfolio composition with AI-assisted graphic styling.
04 / The result
A collection that lives beyond the illustration.
Dino Fun is a launched PartyDeco collection. The product range connects the invitation to play with the objects that make up a party — from the table setting to decorations and gifts.
BRAND — PartyDeco. JOANNA HASS — collection and product design, dinosaur illustrations and pattern; dinosaur-number idea and shapes. COLLABORATION — team development of the number concepts. PHOTOGRAPHY — PartyDeco. STATUS — launched products.
View Dino Fun at PartyDeco ↗︎View the original balloon portfolio boardSource portfolio board / PartyDeco products / AI-assisted graphic styling.
PartyDeco / Creative direction & product development
Safari.
A shared vision, shaped together. Illustrator direction, form development and sample reviews.
Theme & illustrator directionForm & construction conceptsGolden sample reviews
Safari / A world of charactersPartyDeco / Collection photography
01 / The challenge
One direction. A collaborative process.
Guide the illustrator and work with the technical team to turn an animal theme into a family of physical products.
Each animal brings a different silhouette and personality. The challenge was to connect expression, proportions and construction so these distinct forms could belong to the same family.
An illustration.A physical presence.
02 / My decisions
Give the idea a direction and a form.
I selected the theme, sourced the illustrator and guided the visual direction. Alongside that work, I developed form and construction concepts, considering how a drawn character would become a balloon.
My role connected the character of the collection with the physical experience of the products: their silhouettes, scale and presence in a room.
03 / The collaboration
From the drawing to the sample.
I worked with the illustrator and technical team to refine the designs, including golden sample reviews. This joined creative direction with the practical decisions needed to develop the physical forms.
BRAND — PartyDeco. JOANNA HASS — theme selection, illustrator sourcing and direction, form and construction concepts, refinement and golden sample reviews. COLLABORATION — illustrator and technical team.
Supplied portfolio board / collaborative illustration and technical development / AI-assisted graphic styling.
04 / The result
A family with room for personality.
The Safari products were launched for sale. The range shows how creative direction, illustration and construction can bring different animals into one recognisable product world.
The same approach extends to Birthday Cake and Christmas Train. For Birthday Cake, I worked on range selection, a new air-filled form and construction concept, creative direction, and pattern selection and refinement with the team. For Christmas Train, my contribution covered theme and scale, illustrator briefing and refinement through development.
Explore the related Birthday Cake & Christmas Train productsBirthday Cake / PartyDeco / range selection, form and construction concept, creative direction; patterns refined with the team. Launched for sale.Christmas Train / PartyDeco / theme, scale, illustrator briefing and design refinement. Launched for sale.
