With baseball season winding down (and my precious Cubbies’ season ending months ago), all eyes are on the fall ritual of college football. And as with every season, the rivalry games are not to be missed. Last year, Nike decided to jump on the opportunity to promote their new Pro Combat football gear by creating some unique uniforms for a select few teams to sport during their most heated rivalry games. The concept is simple and genius: Nike gets to promote its new gear to teams that may otherwise not buy into it while flexing its design muscles to make each of these teams feel like the University of Oregon. Even if it’s only for a game or two. Read the rest of the entry >

A few months ago, I had an idea for a new personal project. Over the years I had amassed quite a few pairs of shoes. Nothing crazy, but a nice, modest collection that I was really into. Just for Kicks started as an idea to illustrate each pair of my shoes and put them together in a blog (and a book). Every shoe will be illustrated and documented. After those are done, I’m moving onto friends’ and colleagues’ shoes. Shoes are one thing we all have in common. We likely all have a favorite pair – and I want to document that.

The idea behind it was quite simple, really: I wanted to illustrate more. And I needed to create something new to keep myself inspired. A fellow designer  (and close friend), Mig Reyes, spoke to the importance of this idea of “passion projects” recently at HOW (PDF). The presentation was great – and I can’t really replicate it  – but essentially:

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The newest promotion from Neenah Paper is hot off the presses, and it’s designed to inspire creativity. Put down that Wacom pen and pick up an X-Acto: the “Striking Every Time” piece for Oxford and Esse premium papers is more than just an engaging visual and tactile experience for recipients. It asks you to interact, and includes several clock faces that you can assemble and actually use – the kit includes a working clock motor. Read the rest of the entry >

One of the beauties of working at a small design firm is the chance to wear so many hats. Not only am I a designer, but I am also the IT support (or CTO, depending on the day). So, occasionally I get really geeked about some new piece of software, a new apple computer, upgrades to our server, or something else that is equally nerdy.

Most recently, we just purchased the Universal Type Server 2 from Extensis. I’m sure most of you designers out there are familiar with their Suitcase Fusion offerings, which have become rather standard in the industry. We decided to go a step further and get the centralized server version.

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Each year, we pair with some of our partners to create a new promotional piece that we can send out to design friends, clients, and anyone else who has somehow found their way onto our mailing list. We always set out to make this piece a great example of each partner’s capabilities (plain speak – the promos are always pretty rad). For those that don’t remember, last year was our Life In Abundance book, the year before that was our 29 Reasons to Vote and our 3Feasts wine journal.

This year, we wanted to create a piece that was not only easy on the eyes, but also functional in an every day sort of way. After many hours of brainstorming, several Starbucks runs, and the occasional rock-paper-scissors match, we landed on the idea of a perpetual desk calendar. It’s a calendar because, let’s face it, everyone can stand to be a little more organized. It’s perpetual because we don’t want the content within the calendar to go unread once we reach 2011. Read the rest of the entry >