2020 was a tough year for the creative industries, with shrinking budgets and widespread redundancies inevitably impacting people’s ability to produce brilliant creative work and earn a living. As an industry filled with problem solvers, however, last year gave many creatives the opportunity to stop, take stock and work out how to get through even the darkest of moments.

As we enter a new year, complete with a new strain of the virus and yet another national lockdown in the UK, what is clear is that we all need to bring some of that carefully curated resilience into 2021 with us. Here, we speak to experts from across various sectors about how to keep calm and carry on.

ROLL WITH THE PUNCHES

If there is one thing that 2020 taught us, it is that you can’t predict the future. This is a lesson that graphic designer Rejane dal Bello has carried with her since she was a fresh-faced graduate in the year 2000. “It was the year that everybody was predicting a future that was going to be super technological because of the new millennium,” she tells CR.

“I was working as a web designer and programmer at the time, so I was actually shaping my career to be exactly what people were thinking the future would be. Then when the future did not hold up to what people were preaching, I decided not to listen any more and follow what I really wanted to do, and I really focused on graphic design.”