I put together some very nice and interesting coffee packaging design. Let me know if you have any other suggestions or links you share in our comments section. Enjoy!

Bull Run Roasting Company

I’m loving the hand stamped quality of this packaging designed by Jeff Holmberg. This approach makes every package unique, and gives it a hand done feel. It also has a slightly industrial bend which I’m diggin as well!

Images via The Dieline

Stumptown Coffee

Love this cost friendly concept for Stumptown Coffee by Fritz Mesenbrink that includes slits for color coded cards that contained information about the coffee blend, grower information and location. Clever idea!

Images via The Dieline

Artemis Coffee

Love the Art Deco style of this lovely simple coffee packaging by Watts Design. Something about the shapes of this design remind me of A.M. Cassandre’s Pi Volo and Dubonnet wine postsers.

Milano Coffee

I’m enjoying the hand written feel of the Milano ’signature’ on the package. The color coding of the different roasts contrasts nicely with the silver color of the bag. Designed by Demo Graphic.

Calistoga Bakery Cafe

Designed by Vrontikis for Calistoga Bakery Cafe.

I’m definately falling in love with this packaging for a few reasons. 1 The bold colors. I like my coffee to be dark and bold, and this color scheme just brings that back for me. 2 Simple illustrations! Love the beans…they also lead your eye around the packaging and to the information on the other panels. 3 The type is visable but blends in nicely with the illustrations.

Grind Coffee

Grind Coffee, a spectacular senior thesis by Talia Cohen of Rhode Island School of Design.

This packaging stands out to be because of its type heavy design and the scale. The coffee is arranged on a scale from 1-6 based on the boldness and darkness of the roast. Very nice student work!

Intelligentsia Coffee

Designed by Planet Propaganda.

This packaging has a slightly retro feel. Also i’m in love with their logo. How could you not love a flying cup of coffee in the morning (or this could be a sign that you NEED more coffee in the morning lol)

Gorilla Coffee

Designed by One Trick Pony.

I love the fact that one trick pony managed to combine an illustration of NYC and a gorilla! Look closely and you can see it. I’m also quite partial to the black and red color scheme due to a somewhat unhealthy obsession with constructivism from my college days.

Taxi Cafe

Designed by TAXI.

Very simplistic but effective packaging. Read the copy I love it when design is allowed to show a sense of humor!

Ugly Mug Coffee

I posted about ugly mug coffee a while ago when I found it in the grocery store, but its worth pointing out again. I love the fact that they feature pictures of sleepy people and big bold type.

Ugly Mug Coffee is designed by Young and Laramore.

Starbucks Pikes Place Roast

Now i know from my Starbucks vs Dunkin Donuts post that this is a touchy brand for some. But you still have to admire the simplicity and retro-ness of the cup they came out with to show off their pike place roast.

Illy Coffee

Illy coffee’s little red and silver can will always have a special place in my heart. I used to drink illy espresso at home when I was studying abroad in Italy. The design of these cans are so simple, but so effective and iconic – whats not to love (except the fact that they are suppppper expensive here in the states)

MMMMM Packaging Series

Check out the rest of in this series of posts on packaging:

MMMMM Packaging Part 2: Energy Drinks

MMMMM Packaging Part 3: Breakfast Cereal

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Healthy Choice is a lettering project I was involved with approximately 2 years ago. I worked with a group of designers at Brandimage - Desgrippes & Laga refining their concept sketches including some of my own.



These are some of my rough sketches used to produce a closed in series of logos.



During a late night sketching session I started to think about the combination of sans serif with semi script letter forms. Specifically the e, a and c. By including letters that had a open script style the logo got some personality it lacked in previous attempts.

With a solid sketch I produced the vector version and sent it to the creative director. The logo was accepted and some versions were later produced that enclosed the letters in an oval. The final logo of the product line was the version with no oval enclosure.



Several months after working on the project I saw the product line when I was in the grocery store. I noticed that 2 small changes were made internally by the CD with a curved cross stroke of the cap H and a longer ligature of the lowercase y. Both excellent improvements to the logo.

This was a unique project to work on and one that gave me the chance to design a sans semi script type style for a logo printed on an extensive food packaging line.

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This morning I had the pleasure of finding a magazine cover that I illustrated back in 1990. This is a 20 year old illustration and it still holds up as a solid design. I used both Illustrator and Freehand at the time to get the effects for the gearing gradations. With all the advances in Illustrator at present day the gradations are no longer a time consuming process to create.

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This evening I was archiving a bunch of job files from the past year and I noticed some lettering for a Marie Meier project a while ago. This was some of the coolest lettering iI worked on at the beginning of the year. Its always interesting to letter with some tattoo influence for inspiration.



These are the quick sketches. This was one of those projects when I drew the lettering and embellishments freehand in Illustrator. Just winged it. I had a general idea of what I wanted the lettering to look like and used the sketches for a rough template guide.



I drew the lettering for one version on a set of arced guidelines as I needed to produce it for use on apparel.



When drawing the embellishments I started out with smooth curved paths. The paths were offset and I moved the bezier points to change the thickness of the stroke.

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Before starting any project it’s essential to get the right preliminary information from your clients. This will help pave the way to a successful project, assist in bringing client’s vision into perspective and build a lasting relationship. Many of the questions below will also help in putting together an accurate quote for your client. Things such as deadlines, usage, etc. should take into account pricing.

Since my primary focus in is logo design, below are 20 questions to ask your clients prior to beginning their new logo design. Also, many of these questions can be applied to other forms of design, so feel free to integrate them into your questions for various forms of print and web design.

Company-related questions

1- How would you describe your services and/or products?

2- What are the long term goals of your company?

3- Why do you want a new logo? (if they already have one) What do you want your new logo to accomplish?
This question helps to understand the problem.

4- Who are your main competitors?
Having clients provide links allows you to get a better feel for their market and competition.

5- How are you different from your competitors?

6- What’s the age range of your target customer base?
Helps in creating an overall feeling and impression of the logo.

Project-related questions

7- Do you have a tag line? If so, would you like it stated along side your logo?

8- Do you have any specific imagery in mind for your logo?

9- Do you have any color preferences, or existing brand colors?

10- Do you have any colors that you do not wish to use?

11- What adjectives should best describe your logo?

12- What feeling or message do you want your logo to convey to those who view it?

13- How do you prefer your logo to be worded or written out?
Example: thedesigncubicle or the design cubicle

14- How would you like the typography to appear?
Example: script, bold, light, hand drawn, custom lettering

15- Where will you logo be used?
Example: print, web…

16- Where will your logo primarily be used?
If the primary usage is for the web, typically horizontal logos work best.

17- What’s your preferred deadline, time frame or exact date of completion?

18- Budget?
This is where I provide various pricing and concept numbers.

19- Would you like any addition design services to be packaged with your new logo?
Example: business cards, envelops, letterheads, etc.

20- What logos appeal to you and why?
Another question they can also with links and visual examples.

I also like to leave my clients with a field or extra room at the end where they can provide additional details and comments. Remember, being a graphic designer means you are a problem solver. You cannot solve a problem without knowing what the problem is – asking questions is a great start. What questions do you ask your clients prior to starting a project? Feel free to add to the above questions in the comments below.

» Read More...

Before starting any project it’s essential to get the right preliminary information from your clients. This will help pave the way to a successful project, assist in bringing client’s vision into perspective and build a lasting relationship. Many of the questions below will also help in putting together an accurate quote for your client. Things such as deadlines, usage, etc. should take into account pricing.

Since my primary focus in is logo design, below are 20 questions to ask your clients prior to beginning their new logo design. Also, many of these questions can be applied to other forms of design, so feel free to integrate them into your questions for various forms of print and web design.

Company-related questions

1- How would you describe your services and/or products?

2- What are the long term goals of your company?

3- Why do you want a new logo? (if they already have one) What do you want your new logo to accomplish?
This question helps to understand the problem.

4- Who are your main competitors?
Having clients provide links allows you to get a better feel for their market and competition.

5- How are you different from your competitors?

6- What’s the age range of your target customer base?
Helps in creating an overall feeling and impression of the logo.

Project-related questions

7- Do you have a tag line? If so, would you like it stated along side your logo?

8- Do you have any specific imagery in mind for your logo?

9- Do you have any color preferences, or existing brand colors?

10- Do you have any colors that you do not wish to use?

11- What adjectives should best describe your logo?

12- What feeling or message do you want your logo to convey to those who view it?

13- How do you prefer your logo to be worded or written out?
Example: thedesigncubicle or the design cubicle

14- How would you like the typography to appear?
Example: script, bold, light, hand drawn, custom lettering

15- Where will you logo be used?
Example: print, web…

16- Where will your logo primarily be used?
If the primary usage is for the web, typically horizontal logos work best.

17- What’s your preferred deadline, time frame or exact date of completion?

18- Budget?
This is where I provide various pricing and concept numbers.

19- Would you like any addition design services to be packaged with your new logo?
Example: business cards, envelops, letterheads, etc.

20- What logos appeal to you and why?
Another question they can also with links and visual examples.

I also like to leave my clients with a field or extra room at the end where they can provide additional details and comments. Remember, being a graphic designer means you are a problem solver. You cannot solve a problem without knowing what the problem is – asking questions is a great start. What questions do you ask your clients prior to starting a project? Feel free to add to the above questions in the comments below.

» Read More...

Fab Fearon with Fearon May Events sent over some pics of my goods to post on my site!! Hope you enjoyed checking out all the pics from Lavish and Fabulous. :)

Photos Courtesy of:

Moulin Rouge by Sharpe Photographers

All You Need Is Love by Carmen Salazar Photography

Heavy Metal by XSIGHT Photography

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A quick note to mention our studio will be closed Wednesday, November 24th 2010 through Sunday, November 28th celebrating the Thanksgiving holiday with our family and friends. We will return to the studio Monday, November 29th.

Happy Thanksgiving!

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Sometimes ... I have to wait a whole year before I can share what I've been working on!! And that can be realllllly difficult for someone who isn't all that great with waiting to share my day-to-day design projects. Don't want to give away dates, details & locations before my clients big days take place!

That brings us to this little invitation! When Marianne contacted me from {literally!} the other side of the world to create her wedding day invitations I was thrilled! She was referred to me by one of my clients from 2009 that had nuptials in India. Love, love, love working with clients abroad! Definitely gives you some perspective when you're working on a map detailing the Indian Ocean, Paris, Madagascar to name a few - the world is much, much grander than my little bubble of Northern California.

For Marianne and Olivier it was a merging of France & Egypt ... they were looking for something to bring together their origins and how they got to where they are today. Thus, an emotional map of sorts! Taking guests on a little tour of where they were each born, grew up, went off to school, where they met, where Olivier proposed, etc. ... all the way to where the wedding would be held.

And ... I got to stretch my 4 years of high school French {with a lot of help from Olivier}!! Because the invitations were made in English and French. Soooo much fun!

Congrats Marianne & Olivier!!

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The pics for the final table I worked on at Lavish and Fabulous are up on the website! I can't grab pics to post here on my blog for some reason ... sooooo you'll have to hop on over here to view.

Items created by SJD included an invitation, banner and place cards.

The front of the boxed invitation was designed with a feathered boa, taffeta ribbon bow and gold filagree heart pendant with a Swarovski Rivioli crystal. Inside, the invitation was mounted on a layer of black and antiqued ivory paper. The interior top and bottom of the box was tailored with a luxurious pin-tucked taffeta fabric.

The little banner shouted, "CAN! CAN! CAN!" with feather boas and ribbon tying the individual panels together. Came out super-cute!

Place cards were set beneath an acrylic table top and set down into the floral table ... really an awesome effect! Each place card had a giant golden shadow Swarovski Rivioli crystal set atop a ribbon sash.

Below are the amazing vendors that made this vignette come together ...

Creative Designer: Fearon May Events
Place Setting: Tableaux Event Rentals
Drapery: Studio B Event Designs
Lighting: BP Productions
Linen: Mimi & Co.
Invitation & Place cards: Stephanie J Designs
Florist: Bella Bloom
Cake: Shelton's Wedding Cake Designs
Designer Gown: Miosa Couture
Hair & Makeup: Salon Cabochon
Photographed By: Sharpe Photographers

PHOTOTGRAPHY COURTESY OF: SHARPE PHOTOGRAPHERS

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The latest issue of Real Weddings Magazine is out!! We have a new goth-y vamp-y sorta pic featured in our ad. Yummy. Aimee & Jarrod's Malibu wedding was featured inside and yours truly handled the save the dates, invites and dessert tags {see original post here}. And ... we're tickled to have several product shots in the Style Files - Paper. Lolli-stick Dessert Tags, Wedding Invites, Custom Coloring Book & Crayon Pack, Table Cards and a Bridal Shower Invite!!

AIMEE & JARROD'S WEDDING PHOTOGRAPHY COURTESY OF: SARAH MAREN PHOTOTGRAPHY

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Earlier this year I had the pleasure to work with Benjie on some apparel lettering for The Hundreds. A tee with the Fight Back lettering I created is now available in the winter collection at: the online store



Concept sketches for the project.

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Here's a little banner just whipped up this past week for one of my brides from 2007! She is throwing a baby shower for one of her girlfriends this weekend.

Super-cute banner for baby Carson! Nell gave me complete freedom within the color palette of chocolate & blues. I had some fun mixing solids and patterns of stripes, polka dots and plaid. Added in some fun shapes between the letters of ovals, squares and some chunky stars.

I hope it's a hit at the shower!!

Banner Pricing

$45 for the first 5 letters, additional $3.50 per letter thereafter

Custom letter shapes, papers, colors are available!

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