EARNESTLY DESIGNED

Design For A Well Curated Life.

[earnestlydesigned]

Color Palette Trends for 2017; New York Fashion Week

Pantone’s Top 10 Spring 2017 Colors Counts on New York Fashion Week for Inspiration Niagara, Primrose Yellow, Lapis Blue, Flame and Island Paradise were the leading five spring colors based on Pantone's analysis of New York designers' spring runway collections. It should come as no surprise that the color palettes unveiled each year in New York for Spring Collections are the first relevant sneak peek at what is to come in design color use across all mediums. Expect to see these colors finding their way in web and graphic design immediately and then spreading into motion design, home, and commercial design. I have created a quick reference guide with the textile dye color to hex conversion for non-textile applications. https://www.pantone.com/fashion-color-report-spring-2017 New York Fashion Week 2017 - Pantone Top 10 Colors Pantone to Hex Conversion.

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ROGUE LAWMAN

Kickstarter branding keyart.

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THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER

Business-to-business web presence & social media re-branding campaign.

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DESIRE. OBTAIN. CHERISH.

Taken in the alley between 6th and 5th streets. DTLA in the summer 2010. This is the alley that I spun my fur son nearly everyday for three years. This piece is LONG GONE. 

Gone, but not forgotten...

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I just came across a fantastic graphic design and typography magazine from Switzerland called IDPURE. In the current issue the Founder and Editor-in-Chief Thierry Hausermann quotes Albert Einstein reflecting on the economic crisis of 1929.  It does appear that not much has changed in nearly a century. 

"Let's not pretend that things will change if we doing the same things. A crisis can be a real blessing to any person, to any nation. For all crises bring progress. Creativity is born from anguish, just as the day is born from the dark night. It is in crisis that inventiveness, discoveries and great strategies are born. He who overcomes crisis overcomes himself, without being 'over-come.' He who blames his failures on the crisis neglects his own talent, and is more interested in problems than solutions. Incompetence is the true crisis. The greatest inconvenience of people and nations is the laziness with which they attempt to find solutions to their problems. There's no challenge without a crisis. Without challenges, life becomes a routine, a slow agony. There's no merit without crisis. It's in the crisis where we can show the very best in us. Without a crisis, any wind becomes a tender touch. To speak about a crisis is to promote it. Not to speak about it is to exalt conformism. Let us work hard instead. Let us put an end, once and for all, to the menacing crisis that represents the tragedy of not being willing to overcome it"

True then. True now. Do not sit. Stand. This is not the time for self-restraint. It is the time for exertion of ideas and actions.

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SHUGGIE OTIS ROUND ONE

Here is the first design round I did for the Shuggie Otis show at the Echoplex. Comment, “you should really have more fun with it.” So I did. Though I do like this version. It feels like an honest homage to poster art of the era that Shuggie first made his bones in. But that was then and this is now.  Check out the final mashup version. 

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AUDIO SUITE MARQUEE & VINTAGE CAGE LIGHT

This is one of my favorite photos taken of the post facility in Santa Monica I designed last year. In one frame the photographer captured the graphic balance that was used throughout the facility. Here we see the backlit marquee denoting the the audio suite. Above the marquee is a reclaimed cage light with a vintage Edison bulb to accent the sign. In the upper right is a nod to the recording studios of the 30's, 40's & 50's with an exposed RED BULD to alert that live recording is underway.

Each suite in the facility had a similar marquee with unique art depicting each room with an cage accent light. We took what I know look back on now as perhaps a bit too cheeky an approach to this, but they are still fun.

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SHUGGIE OTIS

This is the concert poster I was commissioned to design by my good friend Charra Belle at Spaceland Productions for the recent Shuggie Otis show. It is definitely one of my favorite assignments. I got to do a 1970's soul meets 1980's retro Echo Park Mashup! 

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VINTAGE OLIVE BUCKET LIGHT FIXTURES

Last year I designed a post production house in Santa Monica, CA for Chop House Post. One of the main missions was to make the facility a "green" workspace. This is tougher than it might sound. Since a post-produciton facility eats electricity for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Since there was no way to get around that carbon imprint issue we decided that our green approach would be in the use of reclaimed, sustained and locally produced materials in as many applications as possible.

The olive basket bucket light fixture are a great example of this. Not only are the buckers from sourced locally from a farm in Santa Barbara (at least that is what the bloke from the Rose Bowl Flea market told me), but we also fitted the now up-turned basket will high wattage CFL bulbs. Sixteen of these fixtures were used throughout the 4000 sqf office as the primary lighting source. These were done well over a year ago. At the time I thought it was quite brilliant of my to use them as light fixtures. HAHAHAHA. Now you can find them just about everywhere on etsy. 

With that said though I plan to launch my own line of light fixtures on etsy soon. That will include a version of this fixture, but as a floor standing unit and possible a large scale chandelier.