Day Street Designs is a Chicago business that provides custom-sewn fabric furnishings to interior designers and homeowners. Day Street hired me to update their seven-year-old branding with a new logo, business cards, signs, and web splash page. The objective was to create a more polished look with a logo that’s friendly, a bit quirky, and references mid-century illustration. See the other pieces here in my portfolio.

I sent out the link in my last newsletter, but in case you missed it and would like to print up some stationery, download this. The PDF has four pages— two sheets of note paper and two different envelopes you can cut out and assemble. Print on white paper for a classic look, or try neon or kraft paper for something different. Mix or match scallops and stripes.

One recently completed project was a redesigned website for CLS Complete Lawn & Landscaping Services. Fiaba Creative contracted me to design the site, and Jenn de la Fuente handled the coding. I gave the client three different design concepts with coordinating copy, and they chose this idea. The home page fills a visitor’s browser window with a rotating expanse of well-manicured grass, stone, and plants. Simple links direct visitors to read more about the company’s services, and the yellow promotion violator can be edited or turned on and off as needed.

That grass looks pretty tantalizing to me right now. I can’t wait for summer weather!

Last Easter I made Pantone-inspired eggs. I typed up a label to match each egg color, flipped the file so the text was backwards, and printed them on inkjet temporary tattoo paper.

This year I made egg decals from little hand-drawn flowers I’d scanned and colored. I printed them on tattoo paper again and stuck them on. It’s easy!

If you’d like to make your own floral eggs, feel free to download my file here.

I used Silhouette brand tattoo paper that I purchased at my local PaperSource last year, but you can also get similar stuff from DecalPaper.com.

Following the application instructions on the package, print the designs on the special paper and prepare the tattoos. Trim around the edges of each design, and then place the decal on an egg. Or your arm. Hold a wet cloth on it for 10 seconds and pull off the paper backing. Smooth out any wrinkles with your finger.

Happy Easter!

Let’s pretend you’ve hired a designer to create a logo for your company. In your mind, you’re envisioning the precise shade of green that would make all your logo dreams come true. Your designer says, “Super! Show me a swatch!”

And then you’re stymied—what should you do, go to the paint store? Cough up $135 for a Pantone formula guide? Do a Google image search and hope that a picture with your green shows up on page 47?

Try visiting color.hailpixel.com and run your mouse around the page. Click to lock in a color. Click around some more to add colors to your palette, or click any X to delete them. Click the question mark for info on how to navigate through the hues. When you’re finished, give the color number codes to your designer or take a screen shot and email it.

For the last five years, I’ve crafted an annual Oscar bingo game to make watching the telecast more fun. If you’re not one of the 800 people who signed up at my other blog to get on the mailing list for the emailed file, you can download it right here. Grab the matching ballot of nominees, too, so you and your pals can predict the winners before the show starts and see who has the strongest psychic abilities.

There are 20 different game cards in the bingo file. Save the PDF to your computer, open it in Adobe Reader, and print out the number of pages you need at 100% size.

Download the bingo game

Download the ballot

Happy Oscar viewing on February 24th!

It’s always fun to see where my fabrics end up. Above is the Frond print from my Outside Oslo collection spotted on a camera bag at Ketti Handbags.

The Wildflower print made it onto the cover of a sewing book by Deborah Moebes, and some other designs are featured inside. Here’s a handbag made from Tulip fabric.

I’ve also received reports of Jessica Jones fabric sightings on TV shows and a Windex commercial. When your stuff is in a Windex commercial, you know you’ve arrived.

In honor of the new year, I’ve made a couple of printable bottle tag freebies. Download the PDF here. Then print the page at 100%, cut out the tags, fill out the “to” spaces, and hang them on bottles of wine or champagne you bring to a New Year’s Eve party. Your host will be impressed by your thoughtfulness.

Happy 2013!

Wandering through a Design Within Reach store recently, I was struck by an interview with Charles Eames displayed on a wall. The interview was the basis of an exhibition entitled “What is Design” at the Musée des Arts Décoratifs, Palais de Louvre, in 1972. Questions were posed by Madame L’Amic and answered by Mr. Eames. An excerpt follows.

Q: What is your definition of design?
A:  A plan for arranging elements in such a way as to best accomplish a particular purpose.

Q: Is design an expression of art?
A:  The design is an expression of the purpose. It may (if it is good enough) later be judged as art.

Q: Is design a creation of an individual?
A: No—because to be realistic one must always admit the influence of those who have gone before.

Q: What are the boundaries of design?
A: What are the boundaries of problems?

Q:  Does the creation of design admit constraint?
A:  Design depends largely on constraints.

Q:  What constraints?
A:  The sum of all constraints. Here is one of the few effective keys to the design problem: the ability of the designer to recognize as many of the constraints as possible—his willingness and enthusiasm  for working within these constraints—the constraints of price, size, strength, balance, surface, time, etc.; each problem has its own peculiar list.

Q:  To whom does design address itself: to the greatest number (the masses)? To the specialists or the enlightened amateur? To a privileged social class?
A:  To the need.

Identity projects are my favorite, and this hot-off-the-press work for sister companies Fiaba Creative and Fiaba Productions was lots of fun. It included logo development, company websites, branded templates for email and PowerPoint, and these delicious letterpress business cards. With blue edge painting! They were printed by Boxcar Press on Crane Lettra 220# Fluorescent White stock.

For a peek at the logo development process for this client, view the case study.