SARAHJENNINGS

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DESIGN

People-focused and globally minded, I am an adept communicator and analytical thinker. My skills in Adobe Suite, photography, research, and social media strategy complement my engaging writing style. With a knack for design, a flair for adventure, and a love of stories, I seek to create bold brands and foster community.

EXPLORE TO CREATE

A FLAIR FOR ADVENTURE

Always searching for novelty, I am driven to explore where I live. I cherish my college town of Waco, TX for the challenge of finding beauty in uncommon places. Urban exploration opened up a way for me to practice photography, both of people and environments. This passion to get out and explore brought me diverse friends and a rare insider’s knowledge of my city. I now curate my Instagram carefully, as my following there brings me business doing freelance photography.

FBC WACO COLLEGE

During the summer of 2015, I was a part of the public-ity team for the First Baptist Waco College Ministry. We launched a new website, built and designed by students. I wrote copy and advised on the style and structure of the website. I also created the print components for our new branding: a trifold brochure, flyers, and t-shirts. Not only did I gain valuable insight into website development, but I created a brand from the ground up.

A LOVE FOR PEOPLE

FBC WACO COLLEGE

BAYLOR LARIAT

As a reporter for the Baylor Lariat, I wrote for the Arts & Life section. Combining my love for the Waco community with my creative interests, I learned to weave a story through interviews and produce content quickly.

“ALLURE OF THE ALICO: MYSTERY & HISTORY BEHIND WACO’S FAVORITE BUILDING”From almost every direction, the ALICO building points both strangers and Wacoans downtown. The literal shin-ing beacon connects Waco’s generations together, a common indicator of a life lived in this city.

“I think people like it because it’s such a unique part of Waco,” said Colorado Springs, Colo., senior Victoria Cox. “It’s immediately associative with Waco, but it’s also sort of a mystery.”

The ALICO building was constructed in 1910 for the Amicable Life Insurance Company and designed by archi-tects Roy E. Lane and Sanguinet & Staats. It was the tallest building west of the Mississippi River and south of the Mason-Dixie line until 1929, according to the “Amicable (ALICO) Building” entry by Kyle Baughman and Amanda Sawyer on the Waco History app.

Unlike other structures at the time, the building had a steel frame — the reason it weathered Waco’s 1953 tornado. In all, the building is 303 feet to the top of the flag pole — 22 stories.

Besides the addition of the ALICO lettering, the top of the building has stayed constant. The street level, how-ever, has evolved significantly. With the Urban Renewal Project taking place between 1958 and 1978, the Amicable building became the ALICO Center.

Hunt said the ALICO building gained a new façade indicative of mid-century modern architectural style in 1966. As a kid, he said he used to go to the Austin Avenue pedestrian mall. His interest in the building began then, he said.

“The ALICO was built around 1911 and has adapted so much to its surroundings, matching the street level,” Hunt said. “It grew with the changing surroundings. But now it’s more of a remnant of the radical change that they did to downtown Waco with urban renewal with the pedestrian mall.”

While the history of the building interests many, others are attracted to the building for artistic and photograph-ic purposes.

“The ALICO’s simplicity and iconic all-caps lettering make it an interesting photographic subject,” Hewitt sophomore Timothy Arterbury said. “The building has a very repetitive architectural pattern until the top three floors, where it is more accented. This helps emphasize the top of the building more, drawing people’s eyes to the bright red lettering. It’s also in the heart of downtown Waco, and since it towers over pretty much every other building, nobody can miss seeing it.”

Arterbury is not alone in his interest in the ALICO and Waco architecture. Hunt, an avid photographer as well as a historian, recreated a classic shot of the ALICO from nearby Schmaltz’s Sandwich Shop. The photograph is from the repertoire of one of Waco’s earliest photographers, Fred Gildersleeve.

“I just wanted to see if my lens could replicate, not copy, Gildersleeve’s work, of course,” Hunt said, “It was a challenge. Kind of like climbing a mountain, but taking a picture of the tallest building in Waco. I wanted to get the whole thing into focus, and into proportion.”

People view the ALICO building as a challenge, both to photograph and to climb.

A MIND FOR WRITING

My column, Cookbook Confessions, attracted readers for its quirky projects and humor. I found wacky recipes from cookbooks in a Baylor archive and recreated the recipe.

Want more? Find links to my published work at sarahkjennings.squarespace.com.

“COOKBOOK CONFESSIONS: PRUNE CAKE”

This week, I am working with a recipe provided by the wise and somewhat vague instructions of a Mrs. Jack Scott, a member of the 1948-1949 Killeen High School Parent Teacher Association. Chosen purely out of ap-preciation for brilliant alliteration, the Kangaroo Kook Book surprised me with fascinating recipes like Green Limas in Squash Nests and Harvard Beets.

It’s funny how a city even as provincial as Killeen—a city south of Waco by an hour’s drive—can provide foreign tastes. We likely can credit the 1942 founding of the nearby Fort Hood and the subsequent immigration of sol-diers and their families from all over the U.S. for this strange collection of foods.

Today’s adventure began with another embarrassing checkout at H-E-B. Prunes are apparently great for consti-pation, or so says one snarky cashier.

First things first, I tried cooking the prunes by boiling them on the stove for 20 minutes. This was a total guess, and it only occurred to me after I poured the whole bag into the pot that perhaps boiling would ruin the whole batch. Nevertheless, the prunes cooked perfectly, despite looking disgusting and wrinkly. They tasted amazing.

Mrs. Jack Scott did not record temperature, cooking time or pan size for the prune cake. I chose a Bundt pan and preheated the oven for 350 degrees Fahrenheit. I’m not sure how long it cooked, but I estimate 20 min-utes. Timers are for amateurs. Insert hair flip.

At a whim — brought on from reading the spiced nuts recipe off the back of the allspice jar — I roasted pecans for decoration. I beat one egg’s whites until frothy and added nuts, sugar, cinnamon and allspice. While the pecans roasted next to the cake, I created icing from powdered sugar and milk. The trick is to add the slightest bit of milk to a bowl and then whisk powdered sugar into it until it stops absorbing. This makes an icing rather like the kind on cinnamon rolls.

Cookbook Confessions is teaching me that what we praise as good is sometimes only an arbitrary preference of our culture. For example, in an alternate universe, pumpkins might be revolting. People might believe they are useless vegetables or impossible to cook. Yet somehow, putting pumpkin in lattes became basic.

These foods not often touched, like prunes and pig’s feet, were the key ingredients to dishes every bit as deli-cious as those trendy pins on my Pinterest board.

I’m learning that I have to stop deciding what’s edible based on what I’ve always seen on the menu.

We live in a wonderfully diverse and unexplored world. Knowing this, we have to stop limiting ourselves to cer-tain people, things or activities simply because they’re not what we’re expected to like.

Fall in love with something out of the ordinary this week. Cook something you were never told to like.

A KNACK FOR DESIGN

BAYLOR CAMPUS

RECREATIONSOCIAL MEDIAALICO:

Facebook, Twitter, Instagram @BaylorCampusRecAs an intern on the Baylor Campus Recreation marketing team, I’ve worked on a website re-design, managed social media, and shot high quality photography. Through working on a website re-design, I wrote copy using basic HTML. My main responsibility is social media, where I engage students and faculty through photo contests and consistent, strategic posts.

BEAUTY IN EVERYPERSON

I shoot because I love people. I love capturing their wonder, their imagination, their laughter.

AN EYE FOR BEAUTY

BEAUTY IN EVERYPERSON

We walk each day through a beautiful world. It’s a changing world. In a photograph, we remember a unique moment, one which will never be repeated.

AN EYE FOR BEAUTY

SARAHKJENNINGS .SQUARESPACE.COM

COMMUNICATIONSSPECIALIST

sarahkjennings93@gmail.com | @sarah_jennings