#HTE

How Long Should Your Design Portfolio Be? 

Every Tuesday, we’ll be bringing you a pressing topic of the week straight from our reader-controlled discussion boards! This week, we ponder over the question: what’s the perfect balance for a design portfolio?  Core77-er Alex asks: 

“I am a student graduating in May. Currently my whole portfolio is roughly 50 pages, or 25 spreads. This seems way too long to include in an email and expect professionals to look through for a potential job position.
 
My question is, what do you typically send out for a job application? A shortened work sample? A teaser? How long is this document? What does it include[…]? Professionals, what do you want to see? How many pages per project, on average? 

Currently I have made a "work sample” document that is 7 pages long (cover, one page for each of my five projects, resume, and an about me page). It covers my project topics and gives a teaser of the ID work and final product. Ideally, this would spark interest and then I could follow up by sending my full portfolio with a more thorough process.“ 

Have any firsthand experiences to help answer this question, or simply strong-rooted opinions on the topic? Contribute in the comment feed below and help get the conversation going! Also feel free to check out the original post and contribute on our discussion board.

http://www.core77.com/posts/48631/How-Long-Should-Your-Design-Portfolio-Be