An Artist's Mission to Upgrade Our Staffroom
- 16th May 2025
- Author: Elliott Langley - Marketing Administrator
Every great workplace needs an even greater staffroom. People need somewhere that they can sit back and unwind on their lunchbreaks, maybe with a hot dog from Boosters and a good book. But after many years, our staffroom was well past due for a full renovation. With a lot of hard work from Nikki in our Maintenance team, several coats of pain, and a couple of new sofas, the staffroom has been revitalised and regenerated into a beautiful and peaceful new space for all our staff to use.
However, one talented Space Crew Team Member, Wai-Yen, decided that a final finishing touch was needed to add an extra layer of sophistication to the room. With her background in art and design, Wai-Yen volunteered to create two stunning pieces of artwork to make the space feel unmistakably “National Space Centre”, whilst keeping it warm, calm, and cosy.
I was so impressed with the illustrations, I decided to sit down with Wai-Yen to hear the story behind her creative process and how it all came together.
Hi Wai-Yen. What made you want to take this project on?
The idea just popped into my head when I saw the staffroom was being redecorated. I thought the walls would look really bare without something to draw people’s attention to. You want the staffroom to be a place that’s calm and inviting, so I thought maybe I could make some art for the walls. I studied art at Norwich University of the Arts, so I have a background in this field, and I really felt that I could make a big difference to the staff room and make people enjoy spending time in there even more.
What was your inspiration?
Well, seeing as how everyone would be using it, I thought it was only fair that I get as much input from staff as I could. I put together a questionnaire so I could get a sense of the theme and vibe that people would like to see. The recurring phrases that came up were “warm”, “comfy” and “cosy”, but also to have a space twist.
From that, I made a mental collage of ideas and did lots of research. Then I put on a playlist of my favourite music to get me in the creative mood and brewed some tea to get me going!
What was your creative process?
It was a mixture of working on site at the Centre, and also at home using my own software. I started by making thumbnails of potential ideas I had, then experimented with different colours and shapes. My focus was on celestial bodies and nebulae, as those were a few repeating phrases that popped up in the questionnaire. I had to think about composition, shade, and what colours I wanted to use. The new staff room has light blue walls now, so that was something I kept in mind when choosing my colours.
Once that was done, I decided which of the ideas I liked best and moved them on to a bigger canvas so that I could refine the work. It went through a few iterations as I improved different areas: for example, making the circles neater or adding more detail on the nebulae.
Then the final iterations were finished, and I sent them to the team. I was expecting to get some feedback so I could tweak the pieces, but everyone really liked them, so I didn’t need to change anything from the final designs!
Were there any challenges?
Well, I work full-time on Space Crew, so I needed to balance my time between being downstairs and helping out as I normally would. I would pop upstairs where I could so that I could work on the artwork, and where possible block out some time to work in longer stints. It was a bit of a shuffle, but the team really helped out and covered my positions wherever they could.
Another challenge was that the software I used at work didn’t have the particular star brush that I was after. So I was able to work remotely and use the program I’m more familiar with, and I was able to edit it a bit.
How long did it take?
For the illustration of Saturn, it took me around a month to complete, as I was balancing my Crew work with creating the image. For the Black Hole one, I was able to work remotely while the team covered me, so that one actually only took aro
Have you given the illustrations name?
[Laughs] I haven’t really thought about it to be honest! I kept it very simple to keep in line with the brief, so in my mind they are called Saturn and Black Hole. Maybe I could come up with a more artsy title like Saturn from Titan, an artist’s impression?
I think you should! And so how does it feel to see your artwork framed on the wall?
It doesn’t feel real yet. They’ve only just gone up, so it’s not quite sunk in! It’s lovely to see people going into the staff room and seeing their attention drawn towards the artwork. The staffroom has a really peaceful atmosphere at the moment, it’s nice to go in there and see staff relaxing on the sofas, and I think the artwork makes it easier for people to unwind on their breaks.
I’ll be sure to spend some of my lunchbreaks in there! So finally, have you got any advice for budding illustrators or people looking to get into art?
Well, I think it’s important to acknowledge that making art is challenging. I like to say that there’s a reason that you can’t spell the word ‘painting’ without including the word ‘pain’!
It’s basically an accumulation of effort, patience, and practice, but it’s so worth it in the long run! Making art trains your observational skills, hand-to-eye coordination and dexterity, but the reality is it takes a lot of practice. So if you want to draw, then keep drawing. If you want to paint, then keep painting. Just keep going, keep practicing, and take it seriously.
See Wai-Yen's full artwork below.
Saturn, left, and Black Hole, right, by Wai-Yen Tsim.
