hi hi! i'm shea (24, sh/h) and i'm going to be writing for baek siwan, the creative editorial director of highbrow. you can find the full rundown on him below the cut. please like this post if you're interested in plotting & i'll come to you asap!
tl;dr on his childhood is that he's the only son to a couple that met working in film set design. married a year and a half into the relationship, brought siwan into the picture roughly a year after their marriage despite still being in the rookie phase of work - long days, long nights and rapidly changing schedules would be a lot for one person trying to maintain their marriage and raise a child, let alone both people in said marriage
really, the marriage was fine, the kid was fine, and none of their actions had lasting effects (the last part is false... maybe all of it's false). siwan spent an above average amount of time with grandparents, aunts, and uncles and a smaller (but still above average) amount of time at work with either parent.
a lot of his early interest in the arts came from exposure to his parentsâ work. started getting into photography as a young teen, which both parents supported + nurtured. they were, of course, excited that their only son was shaping up to be an artist like them, so maybe siwanâs lucky in that regard. his mom taught him a lot of the basics of composition & light, and he continued to learn/improve in a photography club at school. wasn't a prodigy by any means, just a kid who had something he enjoyed that he was sort of good at, and was lucky enough to have casual mentors pretty accessible
an unfortunate truth is that part of what appealed to him so much about art is that it made him feel closer to his parents. they were busy, always, and broken promises/changed plans were the norm. it was nice to have something to show/ask them that struck their interest in a real way. not that they weren't interested in what he had going on, it's just... they were busy creatives. and maybe sometimes they weren't the most emotionally present. but by god were they dedicated to their craft/the grind đȘ
post-high school, he was more passionate than ever. enrolled in hongik university as a visual communication design major. met his best friends his freshman year, with whom he started a zine known as terrace, where they all shared the responsibilities of photography/writing/designing/promoting pretty equally. started as a shitty passion project when they were all still learning how to do things the ârightâ way, just covering little local shows, parties, and nightlife. wanted to create something that felt like a community scrapbook/a fragment of youth. carried it on for four years, by which point it was relatively known and anticipated in the local community, and then shut it down when they all started going their separate ways post-college.
after that⊠đ€·ââïž real life started, unfortunately. he did contract work for various publications as a photographer/writer and promoted his own independent work on socials whilst working in a liquor store part-time until he found his first full-time creative job, which was pretty awful. but it built character. thatâs what matters.
managed to get in with harperâs bazaar when he was ~24? which was amazing, obviously - pretty much the best thing he could hope for! immediately became known for his dedication to the grind đȘ his life had become what he'd always thought it would be, and at only 24! he was optimistic. he had big hopes. he was happy, like really happy, most of the time. spent the following years building a solid reputation as a hard worker, an individualistic teamplayer, and dare i say... a visionary. due to several factors (in his mind), he didn't fully realize how important he'd become until 2022, when he was all but offered the role of highbrow's ced. and, to tell you the truth, he... wasn't all that excited about it internally.
has always been a workaholic, became a worse workaholic when he was training for the job, became an even worse workaholic when he fully took over, and then his workaholism reached new heights when his fiancée left him... for, you guessed it, working too much.
present day siwan is... really something. had a very strong sense of individualism and justice as a young adult, was kind of anti-establishment, swore if he were ever in a position of power he'd treat the next gen better than he was treated, and now he's in a position of power and he's exactly like the people who mentored him in the past. puts unrealistic expectations on people because it "builds character" and always manages to find something that needs to be fixed. he's not intentionally mean, but he's incredibly honest when it matters and not afraid of saying the hard things that need to be addressed in the workplace. but he's also this intensely lonely guy who has shaped so much of his life around work that there's not much room left for a social life; so sometimes personal & professional boundaries become a little blurred. type of guy to talk your ear off for thirty minutes about his personal life, and then end the convo by reminding you he needs that doc submitted within the hour. secretly loves when other employees just want to talk to him without needing something from him. has the most pathetic bids for connection you've ever seen - swears he's quitting smoking, but 9/10 times, your smoke break will be intercepted by siwan asking "got one to spare?". likes to talk about ridiculous hypotheticals and is surprisingly open if you catch him at the right time, but will usually act like those conversations never happened afterwards. offers little clarity on where people stand with him. some days he'll stop by your desk just to chat; other days he'll walk right past you without a word. kind of likes when people gossip about him except for when itâs about his fiancĂ©e leaving him or about how much of a "promiscuous networker" heâs become since. sometimes seems like he hates his job, and sometimes he does hate it, but he still finds real joy in small moments and likes to celebrate as a team. very much a âletâs grab lunch together and talk about itâ guy simply for the (forced) companionship and always pretends he canât tell when his lunch partner feels like theyâre in trouble the whole time. overworks, overtasks, overwhelms his assistants until they quit. doesnât consciously do it on purpose, itâs just there are a million things that need to be done and they can handle it, right? :) his favorite part of the job is networking/going to events. a big social drinker, and those whoâve only met him once or twice usually only have good (if slightly strange) things to say about him. loves all forms of art & the easiest way to bond with him is by sharing music recs (the easiest way to break that bond is by asking him a question he already answered in an email). i could ramble about this guy forever but iâve already kind of done that, so iâll end it here. thanks if you read all of thatâŠ
as far as connections go, i'm hoping to brainstorm a vast majority of them so that we can cook up some really fun, unique dynamics :) but i do have a select few dynamics i'd like to toss out there in case anyone's interested:
a younger, passionate employee who reminds him of his younger self. undetermined yet whether or not it's a good thing.
a nepotism hire for him to bully a little bit. someone he pushes really hard to "prove" themselves.
a tentative, probably toxic friendship ofc. one of the only people he considers a real friend, and because of that, they're his most frequent "lunch? :)" victim, his most frequent call when he's drunk, and his most frequent sounding board. unfortunately, he expects a lot from them and isn't very good of a friend in return. there are a lot of different angles that could be fun to explore with this!
