A Design Year Salary Survey

For all of us designers we know design as a competitive sport. And even more competitive is the salary. It depends on your field, technical skill, location, and savvy shoe selection to reach your so called worth. And Coroflot has been nice enough to put together their annual salary survey to further explain what goes into determining the price paid for creative talent. I found it to be very helpful as well as comforting. They also highlight some new trends taking place in the market. By the way if you're a designer and don't check Coroflot to browse the portfolio's for inspiration and job openings for insight, you're nuts. So if you soon find yourself fighting for a raise or negotiating a salary. Take note to some of these tips, brush up on your techs, and go in there with some stats!

Rock Out the Year's End

If you're looking for some good tunes to mix it up to this New Years Eve. Maybe check out Pitchfork's Top 100 Tracks and Top 50 Albums of 2009. There are some pretty cool underground hits, as well as the radio cuts we all loved this year (cue Gucci Mane Wasted). Earlier in the year a friend of mine bypassed buying Jay-Z's Blueprint 3 to get Raekwon's Only built for Cuban Linx album, and funny thing it's listed here as number 5 on Pitchfork's list. Maybe he was onto something, personally I think they're both smoking dope. Either way, check the list, it'll give you some listening or purchase options to rock out a year and ring in a new!

Photography Kick!

Ever see something and say to yourself... Dang it! I wish I thought of that! Well I thought that about Phillip Toledano's conceptual fashion photography. Just genius. Simple, yet creative. And who doesn't love a balloon? Not me! I love balloons.

Flickr Find : Gabriela Camerotti

Bravo! to Miss Camerotti. She somehow manages to capture an eery beauty. Absolutely love it!

Chamillion-Chameleon

Chamillionaire is a rapper I hate. Some people love him, they call him a legend. Liu Bolin is a Chamillionaire I love! Think chameleon, like the animal. Not Chamillion, like an improper/ridiculous amount of money. (What is a "chamillion" anyway? someone? Do tell) Anyway, Liu Bolin has a way of blending into his surroundings. Chamillionaire has a way of clearing a room. But let's address the real artist. The former, not the latter. Bolin is a 37 year old Beijing-based artist who covers himself from head to toe to blend into his backdrop. Whether it be a landscape, a graffiti wall or a construction site; Bolin has turned himself into the "Invisible Man". Now if we could only get Chamillionaire to really disappear...

(look closely, he's in there!)

Funny Story | Legal Weed

(all the designs, possibly oregano, & uptown schwag By: the heads of state)

When I was a junior in college, a fellow designer (who will remain nameless) and myself briefly considered experimental narcotics use in an attempt to become better designers. Wait! before you judge..there was motive. All the kids we knew as great and inspired designers were also stoners (they shall also remain nameless). And we thought, if for a semester we could do drugs, produce awesome designs, our portfolio's senior year would score us a to die for job. Needless to say, we decided to forego our plan of action and buy some more design books and invest our time in new interests (not drug use) to become inspired. Not to mention to tap into our already present natural talent. 

Not long ago I stumbled upon a project by former professor and designer Jason Kernevich (of The Heads of State) called Legal Weed. Developed for Print magazine as a hypothetical take on the legalization of marijuana and the question, What would the packaging look like? It's a pretty fresh approach to a controversial idea. See above. My favorite: Possibly Oregano?

Era Apparel | Tee Shirt Launch

(Swagger Tee)

(Be : Conscious Tee)

Back in July I along with another designer (Caroline Alvarez) and a marketing guru (Tiki Guerrant) launched Era Apparel and Design built to be a creative outlet for our design and corporate lives through fashion, more specifically tee-shirt design. Since then, we've been working to produce more tees, print collateral, and give things away in an attempt to get our pieces in the right hands. We're still working at it, but thought I'd give a little peak into our product....Enjoy!

All things I've wanted to say but haven't

Last year this time I started this blog and since I've only done about 20 posts. Not because there hasn't been any inspiring design in the world, or I haven't seen anything cool (I think I see something cool daily) I just haven't had the time to stop, and tell about it. So I apologize for being a deadbeat and not doing my part to spread the design word. With that said...Let's play catch up....

I know I'm not just coming out of school (we see I'm stuck on this college thing) but I wish someone would have given me these words of wisdom upon my exiting. Or maybe they did and I just didn't listen. But I was hanging out on the AIGA site and read the article After School Special: Advice for Emerging Designers and found myself hearing the reinforcement I needed to hear, and I wasn't emerging from anything. So imagine, had I actually still been a student, the potential it may have had. If we get technical, I could be considered an "emerging" designer dependent on what we judge as an entrance or an exit but that doesn't matter...either way, there are some simple principles to design/live by that will take me pretty far. Enjoy!

I Miss College...Well Sorta.

I will preface this post, as a definite rant. But after seeing this project it made me miss being able to be just that good. Not that I've lost my touch...never that...but as another holiday came and went, I realize how much I miss being in school. In college, I would KNOW when a holiday was coming because it was a chance to come up for air after being buried under paper samples and pantone swatches (this is cool). Now, holiday's breeze by, sprinkled in between work days, and time just seems to blur by. For some reason, this isn't as fun. When it comes to work, I miss being able to get lost in a concept or an idea, so much so, that you forget to call your friends or eat, or even sleep...For some reason, I liked this. That you're buried so much in this "grand" idea you can hardly wait to get it done. I miss the critiques, where you had to pick your work up off the floor because you're professor ripped it off the wall (no, really)..and you realize your idea wasn't really that great. I miss the two hour brainstorming sessions that you had when you were creating the "best" work of your life, not just getting it done. Not that I'm a masochist or something, I just miss being that involved, everything happens so quick now. So as time flies by, I wonder, is this how fast it's gonna go by? Or will there be the chance again to get lost in it? Just wondering.

Credit: Senior Project : Savannah College of Art and Design, Bang-yao Liu. This video is pretty hot!

As I did my iPhone Upgrade...

I'm all about inspiration this month. As I said I'm in a funk, a big creative funk. So.. as my iPhone upgraded (yes, I'm two days late...moving on....) I did some browsing, and found some things to perk up my insides...Enjoy!

Inspiration

So I've been in a rut..and had to bury myself in design mags to get a little inspired. I'm not sure what it is, but it's like someone is siphoning off my design vibes and I have none. Anyway, what brought a little bit of life to my design desert was an article in this month's PRINT. It highlighted patterns of the past reinventing themselves into graphically charged trends of the present. So it sent me on a mini-scavenger hunt (mini=around my apartment) to find these patterns, and surprisingly I did..take a look!

stripes are said to be classic, exuberant, and transgressive!

polka-dots have an energy all their own, inspired by yes..the polka.

 birthed in Paisley, Scotland this pattern has spanned both time and genre

one of my favorites, the fleur de lis, a decorative ornament has inspired many a type of flare. 

Note: Check out the Print Magazine website to download the cool pattern from the article for free.

FRESH

I've been in the trenches and I rarely come up for air. However, I got a fresh breath when I stumbled onto Communication Arts feature on photographer Reynard Li. I love capturing people and admire when people with skill do it. Check the philosophy..it's so real.

Updates to come...Era Apparel launch, 1984 limited editions...Things are looking UP.

You can't deny how brilliant this solution is. So simple, just genius.

Cut and Paste.

Fun Gun, 2005 Paper Collage, 16x19 in., copyright G.Lamarche

If you ever loved paste. Or paper. I love both. I think I ate both at one time or another. (I know) Anyway, if you like that, then you'll love Greg Lamarche. He uses cut paper (type and imagery to be exact) to create these wonderful collages, logo designs and inspiring installations. Featured last August in Print Magazine, he's still at it with solo exhibits in San Francisco and group showings in New York. 

Name Value, 2003, Logo Design, copyright G. Lamarche

WORD, 2004, Cut paper, Bronx River Art Center, Bronx, NY, copyright G. Lamarche

Sunny Days

converse illustrators @ Office Glasgow and London from Orange Dot on Vimeo.

It's Spring! Everywhere. Well not everywhere, but at least the sun is out. And when there is sun, there are smiles! It is proven to show that UV rays (sunlight) promote Vitamin D, which is responsible for metabolism and positive moods (or something like that). So since we're out of the "winter blues", let's have some fun. Check out Converse illustrators at Office in Glasgow and London as they make a masterpiece of these store windows. 

All Things Fun

I've been underground this past month like one of Snow White's seven dwarfs (probably a combination of Grumpy and Sleepy). Whistling while I work, but I did take some break's to umm Heigh-Ho? So although the month's not through, I have some pretty fun updates. First, actually on the 1st, I turned twenty-five. I was blown away by a surprise tea party, just like Alice in Wonderland, complete with friends, scones, tea, and a Mad-Hatter cake! (it would've been discrimination to make one of my short friends dress up like the Mad-Hatter, so the cake was just fine). 

(me, katie, and ashley)

Another fun thing, India's baby shower, coming soon, but the invites are done! The theme is a bedtime story, so of course the invite starts with Once Upon a Time...see pictures below. And last, February is the month of love, and although I don't have a Valentine (well Chloe) but remember the Heavy D joint,  where he was givin Nothin but Love? I used to love that! 

(india's baby shower invite)

                              

Happy New Year!

The new year came mid-month for some of my collegues and designer counterparts as I sent out New Year self-promotions.  They were sent around the country to design firms, agencies, publishers and designers that I admire and appreciate all the like. For those of you that didn't get one - it could still be in my living room or the mailman stole it - but here is the scoop. It's a fortune teller (like the ones from elementary school, high school for some) , you pick a color, pick a number and get a motivational fortune to inspire you through the new year. I plan to keep my own desk-side to serve as a burst of motivation through the cold winter! Enjoy.

My Unofficial Relationship with Type

So yeah I have a thing for type. I like letters, they make me happy. We take long walks, whisper sweet nothings in each other's ear. Okay, no. But I do feel some type of way about a slab-serif lowercase "G".  I never imagined function and fantasy merging and creating .... the " leather type-bag" (gasp!) Yes, I kid you not. A handbag, made from type! (shock! and awe!) 

from Assouline ($450) made by Cole Haan...fabulous yes!

Also some creative things from The Heads of State, former professor Jason Kernevich and partner (design partner folks) Dusty Summers. They went back to their Alma mater Tyler School of Art (Philadelphia, PA) and carved an alphabet in the ceiling (pretty awesome huh?). See kids this is what you can do when you graduate and make a name for yourself. Slam! Those guys are always up to something creative, check their site, check the accolades...check their books, they have to bribing someone. Seriously, they're crazy talented.