Can you still be vegetarian if you eat Wacky Wednesday every week

So, this year I gave up eating meat. I still eat fish and seafood. But no meat. And I was doing pretty well until last month when suddenly the cravings for a solid 100% beef burger started to drive me crazy. So...um...I caved and succumbed to the ultimate beef burger. KFC? I could hold off. McDonalds? No problem. Spur? Easy peasy. Steers Wacky Wednesday special - two glorious 100% beef burgers for the price of one? Mmmm

So I suppose the question 'can you still be vegetarian if you eat Wacky Wednesday every week? Answer: No, probably not! But dang, this burger, both these burgers are worth it.


Image: www.steers.co.za

If you can't stand the heat...

...get out of the kitchen?

Great saying, but not really possible when the heat isn't limited to the kitchen. It turns out that I may not be fully ready for summer after all. Monday and Tuesday were both incredibly warm days, and I refused to stay down. Running around town to meetings, working up a storm from a non air conditioned home desk meant that I ended up passed out on the bed before 5pm yesterday. Exhausted and drained. Probably my own fault for not sticking to the 2 litres of water a day advice. The good news is that I awoke at 5am sharp this morning to a much more refreshing day (never thought I'd see the day when I'd describe cloud cover as refreshing!) and was rearing to go. Now, if only my clients were at their offices at 5am....

What to do when its 29º?

Go to the beach of course. Woke up to the most beautiful day - warm wind wafting through the house...I knew it would get uncomfortable very quickly. So I packed a beach bag and cheapo umbrella (the only one left in the shops at the end of last summer!) and headed to the beach. Was going to make it all the way to Fishhoek but was distracted by the idea of all the sexy surfers at Muizenberg. Architecture also swayed me - I love the old retro buildings in and around Muizenberg, St James and Kalk Bay. Conjures up memories from when I was a kid...and thankfully quite a few of the old buildings are still standing. I wonder how long for though, seeing as developers are swarming in to 'save' these buildings by putting up huge sheets of glass and modern facades. It's a pity. All in all, there's no better city to play tourist in your own town in than Cape Town.

Could I have done this if I worked 9-5 at an office job? No way....at least not without a lot of lying and cheating and crying and pleading and extreme guilt on Monday morning. And that, my friends, is just another reason why being a freelance graphic designer in Cape Town is the bees knees!!!

The freelance life can get a little lonely

Sometimes you find yourself wishing you had office colleagues - that annoying yet comforting ambient sound that used to disrupt any serious 'zoning' attempts. There's plenty that one can do to distract oneself - make a cuppa tea, fix lunch, put on the telly....Judges Judy & Mathis are dangerous resorts though, call a friend. All things that reinforce the procrastination on the latest project you should be working on.

And now I have a new one. Online dating. I got so bored today I actually signed up for not 1, not 2, but 3 online dating sites. Granted, 2 & 3 were only a result of learning that 1 was not a free service. Not a simple process either I have to add. Find cute, accessible, sexy photo of oneself....mmmm, none available so will need to whip out handy iPhone and organise a home photo shoot. And this was probably the hardest part of the entire experience. Eventually, after perching on the couch arm facing a mirror to check the preview on the iPhone I am proud to say that I managed to take a half decent, half sexy, boobs out, hair tossled, sunnies on indoors to maintain anonymity photograph. Minimal photoshoppping needed. Just a little colour added to the lips.


And then I proceeded to regurgitate the most inanely cliched attributes which I was prompted to input in an attempt to hook a man.

A complete waste of time? Definitely! But the unexpected reply to my ad within 5 minutes of posting (I'll give the credit to the major boobage photo and not my witty intelligent comments) was a HUGE boost to my bored ego....and the second reply, and the third reply....pity none of them had any reciprocating pics :(

Verdict after the first day? I still prefer meeting my guys the good old fashioned way - can I buy you a drink?

When your clients are younger than you!

These were a great group of guys who needed a new brochure for their company. I had loads of fun with them. An A3 folded to A4 brochure. What was quite different for me is that they had very definite ideas about what they required and so a large part of the project was me actioning their requests. At least I know that they're happy with the end result.

My only problem is that they work so hard I couldn't find a way to make friends with them to absorb all the genius...

The company I (thought I) always wanted to design for

An interesting project. My housemate works for the the client and I'd always been more than eager to show them what I can do. So I eventually got my chance. Stress, tension, apprehension, all of those endearing emotions which drive you to nicotine and the initial feedback was actually positive. Whoo hoo...but then the brief changed. And the design needed to change to fit the new brief and eventually the original designer was put back on the job. A little bit of nastiness? I cannot believe what he submitted...I wasn't going to add this work to my portfolio. But after seeing the final artwork, I couldn't resist a not so subtle pat on my back.

New Corporate Identity

I've just finished a new corporate identity for a tour operator - Oemies Tours. It was a nice change learning about the Arabic alphabet and how words are constructed. Took me a while to get the hang of reading right to left. So the logo is based on the word Oemie which means Mother. I surrounded the Arabic 'mother' with concentric circles in varying colours to symbolise the diversity in Cape Town. As well chose earthy African colours. I learned that the deep green is an important colour in Islamic tradition and so this was incorporate. All in all a logo, business card, brochure and banner were produced.

Isibindi

A Germany based non profit organisation focussing on kids needed a new logo and roll up banner for an upcoming event. I focussed on Africa as these are the kids they are committed to helping and on a beautiful warm sunny yellow that would represent the african sun....

Logo for Megy's Beauty Clinic - a boutique beauty salon situated in the heart of upper Cape Town with exquisite views of Table Mountain.



Flyer



and website for Megy's Beauty Clinic

Ibo Silver

And then just after the flyers had been printed they asked if I could create a poster which would be used as a backdrop to a silversmith who had been especially flown down from Mozambique to show the process of creating the beautifully intricate pieces of silver jewellery.

Another post...finally

How is it that someone who reads blogs religiously can't seem to update their own blog religiously? Here's some of what I've been up to lately.

Ibo Island and Mozambique Travel - awesome company who organise tours and trips to Mozambique. These flyers were done fairly quickly as I didn't have much time to make their deadline. Beautiful, beautiful images which were quite distracting really!

SolarTech brochure

SolarTech - solar powered geysers. By far one of my favourite projects. Not least of all because their company belief and goal is to provide an environmentally responsible product. A company with a conscience.

They already had a strong brand and the only change to this that I made was to convince them to steer away from the sickly 100% yellow and add a tinge of magenta to create a warmer richer deeper yellow. Essentially I echoed the cog and circular shapes from the logo and ran the text in around those shapes. It was good to be able to use most of my ideas as the brochure was 620 x 207 Z-folded to A4. Which gave me three independent yet symbiotic and flowing A4 panels on each side. I look forward to working with this client again. Strong brand, great environmentally aware product and an awesome client who knew what he wanted.

Cape Sightseeing

Beautiful couple who own a sightseeing company. Again, the most frustrating part of the project was avoiding getting distracted into planning a sightseeing trip. Quite a few web images used which was disappointing but by the client's insistence. We did agree though that seeing as their job requires taking the tours everyday....and seeing as they have an awesome camera....they should start documenting their tours!

I really did enjoy working on this project. I focussed on keeping the background as simple as possible to show off the incredible views. They were very keen on incorporating the tourist theme so pictures were made to look like postcards and travel tags were added to the prices. Their brand colours were based on an African sunset (the best kind) and so using yellow, orange and red were imperative to echo their brand. Very friendly colours.

Rouge Clothing Design

A pretty simple and obvious design. The client already had an idea of what she wanted. This idea was so strong and obvious that I stuck to the text style and colour and just tried to add elements that would help make the connection to clothing designer.

We've yet to print the business cards. I'd like to see either a spot UV over the word 'rouge' or embossing the word...but I've never made peace with the reverse side of embossing. Definitely printed on an off white, creamy undertoned paper.

Own Property in Mauritius

Design for a flyer drop for a, for the time being, impossible dream. Stock images galore which I wasn't too happy about but a very relaxing and enjoyable process.

Youth End Poverty

The name says it all. A non profit organisation run concurrently in Scotland and Cape Town which encourages young people to make a difference through education and self knowledge that will ultimately end poverty. Knowing that it was run by young people for young people I tended towards something unusual. A little graffiti, why not tilt every, and sticking to only two colours to make printing a more cost effective exercise. Again, I was happy with the idea.

However, I'm quite please to say, despite approving of the idea they decided to have the young participants create their own identity which is probably the most important teaching that they encourage - Create Your Own Identity.

The Villa

A beautiful property in Constantia, again, which was temporarily on the market needed an 'above average' real estate flyer. I can honestly say that I am happier than ever that the house was not sold (not due to the design of the flyer! the owner changed his mind) and has become a wonderful home with an awe inspiring view. Perfect for early morning breakfasts as well as any time of day cocktails.

Nova Constantia Boutique Hotel

A luxury boutique hotel in the heart of Constantia. I thoroughly enjoyed working with the couple who own and manage this new boutique hotel. We designed a full range of corporate stationery for Nova Constantia including business cards, letterheads, envelopes and a brochure in both English and Czech.

The brochure had a doubly luxurious finishing of matt lamination and gold foiling which definitely upped the exclusive opulence factor.

Itshoba Investment

Itshoba decided to expand into an investment and financing company and required a completely different brand but still using the same name. This was the option we finally settled for. Bright colours in strong power, reminiscent of african sunset, colours. The 'i' morphed nicely into an archway was intended to depict a gateway to more financial options. And I echoed the 'gateway' by clipping a duplicate hole from the 'o's on the flip side of the card. I was very happy with the result. Fresh and accessible.

And now it's 2009

After a long silence I'm back. Here's what I've decided to use as my visual identity. I think the fresh bright colours are a nice juxtaposition against the illustrated background of natural wood....why the keyhole? I sometimes think that the perfect design is very similar to finding the right key to unlocking and opening the door to the company or products visual communication. And I've just realised how apt it is that the keyhole is placed on a wooden (door?) background.



I didn't want to be stuck with one colour forever and so thought a combination of brights, which look really great together, was the answer. A nice little surprise when, as often one assumes only one colour way for a company identity, a client is presented with a choice...and can pick the one they most associate themselves with. Ahhh, mmmm, should I be reading into their colour choices.....