I got a new website, time to start a new blog!

Surprise Mercury Appearance.

I was at a bar with a friend catching up after a recent vacation, when I looked down at The Mercury he was perusing and saw a small square of myself (well, my art, rather). How exciting!

It’s actually a drawing I made for my ma a few mother’s days ago:

WARNING, GROSS PIX AHEAD

Last Thursday (technically Friday, 3am) I experienced my first bike fall—and boy was it a doozy:

I’ve never been seriously injured before in my life, which is pretty good for 22. I was always a very cautious kid. When my friends would climb trees, I always offered to be ‘look-out’. In the three years I played soccer, I never once was goalie (I always traded my turn for another kid’s half-time juice box—win win!). I didn’t even learn how to ride a bike until age 18 (well after I learned how to drive a car); and I’ve only just begun to ride in the street instead of on the sidewalk. Needless to say, an experience like this has been a long time coming.

I’ve been struggling with having something so gnarly on my face. Although my instinct was to just hermit myself while I healed, a girl has to work. I have become painfully aware of my painful injury, as every customer either has a story to tell, sympathy to give, or an unfunny comment about how it looks like a goatee (hence the insecurity). It’s getting easier and easier though, and I should be taking out the stitches this Sunday before I leave for Tacoma (and then to Hawaii).

It hasn’t been an easy start to the summer. While all this has been going on I am also in the process of a painful end to a four-year relationship (but I won’t get into that). I am still confident about the future though, everything happens for a reason and all that jazz.

brag brag brag

It’s pretty tragic that I haven’t updated my blog for the entire last semester at college. Got extremely sidetracked with thesis, but all those late studio nights paid off. I’m now graduated with a 3.8 gpa, a high-pass thesis paper, and the design departmental award. </bragparty>

Now on to ‘real life’ as they say. I’ve been doing more freelancing and (after an exciting vacation to visit my sister in Hawaii this June) will be ready to look for a full-time design position. If I don’t find something within a year, I think I might move back to the Seattle area to look for work. We’ll see!

Movin’ on up

So if you know me, you know I’ve been doing the chalkboards at Zupan’s for nearly two years. While I’ve learned a lot doing these— I always find myself wishing I had more time to work on them. I think with the time to plan and practice— you can really take the medium to a beautiful level. One contemporary designer that proves this point is Dana Tanamachi. Her chalk typography is really something to be admired. Her newest one has to be my favorite, it completely evokes Mad Men.

So with the thought in mind that I wanted more time to work, coupled with the cold weather that makes it such a chore to do outside— I got a chalkboard for christmas!

Here is a photo of it, with an adorable niece in front (for size comparison, naturally).

almost worth it.

If nothing becomes of my last four years studying design, at least I will always have this wee screenshot:

… and that is all there is to say about that.

Get control

Trying my hardest to learn keynote and develop my whole thesis presentation over the weekend. Yikes! Doing my best to keep my cool and not stress, we’ll see how long that lasts—feel free to take bets, haha.

Not only am I working to the bone on my thesis proposal this month, I am also in the midst of my first legit freelancing project. I scored a really good one through a friend at work, and believe me they are the best clients I could ask for. They approached me wanting to completely change the way they do ads and wanted a more creative, unique, and localized feel. Now that I can deliver. More to come on that.

Gayngs – Gaudy Side Of Town

^Highly recommended.

Kind of Blue

So I was checking up on the Paste Mag website (hey, better than Pitchfork) and I noticed the cover for their music sampler jumping out at me:

Thank goodness they use this (or a variation of) for all their music samplers. It’s gorgeous! I love jazz-cover graphics. Last year I had a book-collection of them checked out from the library that I must have renewed 20 times, I just couldn’t grasp the whole thing in the allotted three weeks. Now if only Paste could change their hideous logo. Ugh, so 1998 (did I really just say that?).

Speaking of jazz-inspired, look at these skate decks [Miles ‘59 Quintet Series] by Ian Johnson:

Charlie Parker feat. Miles Davis Moore – Moose the Mooche (Quantic Remix)

Post from flatland

The Zombies – Road Runner

Chart it up

What better way to sum up what I did at my summer internship than with a chart!

It had its hard points but, over all, I think it was an extremely successful experience. A lot of work for no pay, but completely worth the time. They trusted me with real projects and I learned a lot about the publishing industry and working in a small design department (was and remains my ideal job set-up).

In addition to completing an internship, I finished another one of my ‘summer goals’ this Sunday when I got my first tattoo! More on that later.

CocoRosie – Beautiful Boyz