Graphic Design Basics - Live Webinars
What does it actually take to read a design before you make one?
Benchorchardwood runs live online sessions on graphic design - from layout logic and colour theory to TV studio design principles used in real broadcast environments. Sessions are structured for people who want to understand the craft, not just copy it.
Is this for you?
Some people leave after the first session. That is not a failure - it is the point.
These sessions are built around a specific kind of learner: someone who already has a reason to understand design - a project, a career shift, or a gap they keep noticing. If you are looking for a general overview with no pressure to apply anything, this is probably not the right fit.
The content covers technical ground - grid systems, typographic hierarchy, colour relationships, and the visual logic behind television studio design and broadcast environments. Sessions move at a pace that assumes curiosity, not prior training.
You are a communicator, marketer, or content producer who needs to brief designers more precisely and understand what you are reviewing.
You are starting out in design and want structured exposure to real production contexts - including how television studio design shapes visual decisions.
You work in media or education and want to understand the visual grammar used in broadcast and digital environments.
You want a shortcut to a portfolio in under a week, or you are looking for software tutorials rather than design thinking.
That moment when the screen looks wrong but you cannot say why
Most people who come to these sessions describe the same thing: they can see that something is off in a layout or a broadcast frame, but they do not have the vocabulary to name it. That gap - between perception and language - is exactly what the sessions address.
A marketing coordinator at a regional broadcaster kept flagging design issues in their show graphics - but every revision came back wrong because she could not articulate what the problem was. After three sessions covering visual hierarchy and television studio design conventions, she could write a precise brief. The revisions stopped going in circles.
This is not about becoming a designer. It is about developing enough visual literacy to work alongside designers - or to make better decisions when working alone.
The people in the room matter as much as the content
Sessions run with a fixed group size - no more than 18 participants. The format is built around discussion, not broadcast. Participants ask questions during the session, not after.
A short brief is shared 48 hours ahead. Participants review one real-world design example and note what they observe - no preparation required beyond looking.
The session opens with what participants noticed. The facilitator builds from those observations into the session's core concept - whether that is grid logic, colour contrast, or spatial layout in broadcast design.
A written summary and one practical exercise are shared. The exercise is optional but most participants complete it - the group reviews responses in the next session.
Participants have access to a shared workspace where they post work-in-progress and ask questions. Responses come from peers and facilitators - typically within a working day.
Who runs the sessions
Not instructors. Practitioners who also teach.
The people who deliver Benchorchardwood's sessions have worked in production environments - not just studied them. Facilitators have backgrounds in editorial design, broadcast graphics, and spatial layout for television studio design projects across the Western Cape region.
Each session is led by one facilitator with direct experience in the topic being covered. When the session covers broadcast environments, the facilitator has worked in one. That specificity is deliberate.
Adaeze Okonkwo
Design Facilitator & Broadcast Specialist
Broadcast production background
Facilitators have worked on television studio design and on-screen graphics for regional broadcasters - not simulated projects.
Curriculum built from real briefs
Session content comes from actual design problems encountered in production - not from textbook examples adapted for teaching.
Small group format only
Facilitators run sessions for a maximum of 18 participants. Larger groups are not taken - the format does not work at scale.
Cape Town-based, regionally focused
Content references local production contexts and South African visual media - relevant for participants working in the region.
After the sessions end
What stays useful six months later
A working vocabulary
Participants leave with language they can use in real conversations - with designers, clients, and production teams. Terms like leading, visual weight, and safe zones in television studio design stop being abstract.
Trained observation
The sessions develop the habit of reading a layout before reacting to it. That habit persists - participants report noticing design decisions in everyday media long after the sessions are done.
Peer references
The small group format means participants know each other's work. Several have continued collaborating after sessions ended - on freelance projects, internal briefs, and regional media work.
In their words
Specific accounts from people who completed the programme
"I had been working with a design agency for two years and always felt like I was approving things I did not fully understand. After the second session on grid systems, I started asking different questions. The agency noticed - they said the briefs had improved."
Tarquin Ferreira
Communications Manager, Cape Town
"The session on television studio design was the one that clicked for me. I had been doing set layout for a small production company and kept getting feedback that things looked 'flat' on camera. The session gave me the spatial reasoning to understand why - and what to adjust."
Sipho Dlamini
Set Designer, Western Cape
"I came in with no design background - just a lot of opinions about what looked good or bad. The sessions gave those opinions a structure. I still do not work as a designer, but I manage a team that does, and the difference in how I give feedback is noticeable."
Liezel van Wyk
Creative Director, Johannesburg
"The part that surprised me was how much of graphic design basics carries over into physical space. The session on proportion and visual weight directly influenced how I started thinking about television studio design - the logic is the same, just applied differently."
Nneka Osei-Bonsu
Interior & Broadcast Spatial Designer