Design – Page 7 – Holly Whittlef

September 7, 2014 — Comments are off for this post.

WORK / THERA + ROBB

I have to admit I love designing wedding invitations. Even though I've attended many weddings, I'm not really the wedding gushy type ( I'll probs elope to the courthouse, thankyouverymuch ), but I do love a custom hand-lettered invitation suite. Lettering is only my favoritest thing ever, you know. Luckily, the cute, hip brides getting hitched these days are taking notice.

Earlier this year, Thera came to me looking for hand-lettered invitations for her May nuptials. Once she sent me her Pinterest inspiration board, and I saw navy blue invites printed with gold foil, I literally pumped my fist in the air and screamed, "Yessssss!" loud enough for my weird-ass neighbors to hear. There was no way I was NOT designing navy blue + gold foil invites.

After a few renditions of hand type, rounds of edits + snafus with the gold foil printers, we were graced with these gorgeous invites. Clean, modern and classy...they look even better in person. Those gold foil lights might be my favorite part. That or the placecards with light strings, where the number of strings corresponds to your meal preference. I mean, seriously. So good.

Soooo, what I am trying to say is that if you are cool like Thera and want hand-lettered wedding invitations, please do let me know. Not only will you help me continue to annoy my weird-ass neighbors, but you'll make me one very happy hand-lettering lady.

[ invitation photos by me, wedding photos courtesy of Bernadette Pollard ]

Published by Holly Whittlef in Design, hand-lettering

September 4, 2014 — Comments are off for this post.

PROCESS / 02

If we're doing a round of #truththursdays here, I must admit I haven't always been the designer I want to be. One of my big mistakes : working harder, not smarter.

It's just one of the many things I've effed up since I started freelancing for myself more than a year ago ( another post I plan on writing soon ). I'm constantly making mistakes and learning from them. One of the best things I can do through that process is be my own best friend and strive try to do better next time. Which is why I've been buying blood orange sorbet ( check on self-BFF status! ), and working towards building a better design process workflow for my clients.

One simple way I have started to do this is with moodboards.

Moodboards are an easy beginning step in the relationship between designer + client to ensure both parties are on the same page. It's a small collection of images, typography, color and other inspiration that sets the tone for the branding or project at hand. The designer shows the client they get what he/she is looking for, and the client is reassured the designer understands their aesthetic. It can go a long way in ameliorating conflicts down the line.

This moodboard is for a current client of mine—two sisters passionate about bringing all-natural skin care + beauty products to the masses. The look is equal parts organic, modern + cool. And I'm happy to report they loved the moodboard + wanted it printed out for their wall ( me too! ).

So what did we learn today, kids? Smarter, not harder. Be your own BFF. Moodboards...always moodboards.

Published by Holly Whittlef in Design, process

August 7, 2014 — Comments are off for this post.

WORK / IMPACT INITIATIVE

Last fall, one of my teachers ( slash mentor + friend ) asked me to be a part of a project her freelance collective had been hired to design. Little did I know how much I would learn over the next six months and how much I would come to realize the occasional beer really helps when you're working on big, complicated + transformative design work.

That project is the Impact Initiative, Madison College's Academic Plan for 2014 - 2017.

If there's one thing you take away from this post, it's this: the world is changing, and fast. It has huge potential for positive transformation within our academic institutions, and this report reflects how Madison College ( our area's technical school ) needs to adapt its programming in order to face these imminent changes. Did you know the majority of people in higher education are women? That HALF of all nurses will be at retirement age by 2020? That roughly 60% of jobs that will exist 10 years from now haven't been invented yet? These are big things.

Luckily, our problem as designers was not to solve these issues ( whew! ), but rather to highlight how Madison College is responding to them through a 100+ page report, posters and a super slick responsive website. In an age where, sadly, reading is become less important as attention spans wither, we chose to design heavily with infographics. Even if people don't read the full report, they will be able to understand the story through eye-catching illustrations, graphs and graphics.

With just four of us on the team, we worked crazy hard to finish this for its March launch. As a student, it was such an incredible learning experience—from project management to delegation to design to working with the client to learning about website design to experiencing first hand how a big project like this all comes together. It was a tough six months, but oh so worth it.

And I do highly encourage you to download the report as well as visit the website. No pressure, but a quick five-minute look won't hurt you. Because no matter who you are out there, our future workforce is changing and the results will affect all of us.

Okay, I just realized that sounded really doomsday-ish, but it's not. There are exciting things happening in this crazy world, so best to keep in the know. Then when all else fails, beer.

Published by alphablossom in Design

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