Taylor Rutledge!
Taylor is, we are fairly certain, the *only* intern we’ve ever tried to dig up dirt on, and we failed. You see, she went to high school with Amy’s old roommate Nick. So Amy emailed him for dirt, and the “dirt” — if you can even call it that — was something along the lines of “Oh yeah, she was valedictorian, she was nice to everyone, she did really well in art school…” As it happens, digging up dirt on someone is not as fun as you might think. Which is, really, for the best.
And in this case, the SUPER best. Taylor came in for an interview. We liked her right away. She talked about how she wanted to make beautiful books, and her eyes lit up such that we essentially offered her our publishing internship on the spot.
Certainly, as it turns out, one of the best business decisions we’ve made. Because not only does Taylor want to make beautiful books, she does. (Sometimes this is not so, n’est pas?) She excitedly signed up for a class on design software of her own accord. She attentively sat through Amy’s InDesign training (It starts with “I’m sure there are better ways to do all this, but this is how I’ve come to do it” and has plenty of “Oh wait, no…,” “Oops, that’s not right,” and “Where is that function again?” peppered throughout.). She worked on her first book for us, Sincerely, Concerned Citizen, a collection of social justice writings from the students at University Prep in Detroit under the watchful eye of Amy and the guidance of our former publishing intern, the one and only Jared Hawkley (who is probably teaching dogs to sled as we type this; hi Jared!).
And then she took over. And now, four months into her internship, we basically send her the materials for a book, a few ideas, and some vague directions, and then we put it out of our minds. And then, when maybe we were just about to forget about it, she shows up with some BEAUTIFUL thing, some GORGEOUS volume, some EXPERTLY CRAFTED work of art.
Are you guys of the school of thought that books should feel good to hold in your hands? We are. And to that school of thought, Taylor delivers. From the hand-bound Susan LaMoreaux Compendium (soon to be for sale in the robot shop!) to the one-of-a-kind (by which we mean to say there is literally only one in existence) accordion-folded six-word-memoir collection from Ozone House, to the stunningly designed ELL chapbook from one of our summer programs, Taylor approaches every project we throw at her with professionalism, creativity, and focus.
What we are trying to say is: She’s one of a kind, just like the amazing books she makes.
Furthermore, she IS really nice, just like Nick said she would be. And she loves baseball. And for money, she makes cakes. And she has good style. And great ideas. She is currently at work on a couple of cookbooks for us, and we can’t wait to see them. The ideas she had in the brainstorming phase were out of this world. Hey! We’ll keep you posted.
Taylor? We think you’re great! We could not be more impressed with the work you’ve done for us. Thank you!