Oregon Flora is an incredible repository of information on more than 4700 vascular plants across the state. I completely overhauled the site to clearly communicate its value, relevance and importance, redesigned the UI of its tools to make them more intuitive to both experts and a plant-loving public, and overall, made this complex dataset more accessible – even fun... [There’s more]
Creative direction, design, art direction and precision production
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Nick Fish for Portland
I consulted on two ultimately victorious political campaigns this spring, contributing foundational messaging strategy to both. Closest to home was Portland City Councilor Nick Fish’s bid for re-election against a tough, insurgent challenger.The result? A resounding 61.8% of the vote in the primary, well past the 50% threshold that would have forced a runoff in November. Now, instead of running for office this summer and fall, Nick can devote all his considerable energy to the important work he does for all Portlanders on City Council... [There’s more] -
plasq.com
After creating the UX and UI for Comic Touch, plasq's spiffy comic book cover creation app, I had a pretty good idea about who the company was and what it stood for. So when they asked me to revitalize and refocus the company's website, I knew immediately what it should say: fun. Like a comic book, but with scroll bars.Working with plasq's onsite developer, I created a bright, sunny and light-hearted UI, steeped in the visual language of classic comic books... [There’s more] -
Montessori Public
You may not know this about me, but a long time ago, I ran an alternative paper here in Portland. We called it "The Free Agent," and in addition to editing the rag, it was my first large-scale design project. I remember the warm, round smell of hot wax (used to stick columns of text to boards), the din of newsprint speeding through the rollers, the satisfaction of turning the pages in my hand after I grabbed one, literally hot off the press.So you can imagine how excited I was when the National Center for Montessori in the Public Sector asked me to help them revive the newspaper it sends to its teachers and schools around the country. It was like getting back on a bicycle after a long hiatus, only now I had 25 years of experience to leverage as I hopped on ... [There’s more] -
Outdoor School for All
[UPDATE 11.08.16: The Outdoor School for All initiative passes overwhelmingly!]Since its first band of Medford sixth graders in 1957, Outdoor School’s mission has been simple: get our next generation of leaders off the couch and out into Oregon’s great outdoors. It's a uniquely Oregon tradition, and one that reflects the heart and soul of what it means to live here. The problem is that because of increasingly tight school budgets, currently only about half of Oregon’s students get to experience Outdoor School.The braintrust behind this worthy initiative asked me to help articulate exactly why it's in every Oregonian's interest to bring this to life. From a creative brief I developed pinpointing the advantages and opportunities of Outdoor School, I created branding, an introductory pitch brochure, and a leave-behind addressing funding head-on. -
Growing Gardens
Simply put, Growing Gardens teaches people how to grow their own food in their own back yards. And that's part of why I love it, and have been donating my time to it since 2011: the simplicity of the concept. With the simple act of growing your own food, you get healthier people, a healthier planet, and healthier communities. That's a lot of bang for your buck.I started donating design and production of their annual reports but quickly expanding my role into communications and brand strategy, focusing and refining how they talk about what they do and why it matters. That effort culminated in this "seed packet" I wrote and designed... -
The BTA Alice Awards
It's been an honor to support the Bicycle Transportation Alliance with strategy and creative for its signature fundraising event – the Alice Awards + Auction – since its very first edition. But this year was different: after more than 25 years, the organization was changing its name and expanding its mission beyond bicycling to walking and transit.So, really, the BTA turned to me with two projects in one: not only branding strategy and creative for the event, but for the new organization, too. -
Les Garagistes Winery
Okay, full disclosure: this is a project where the client is me. Or to be more precise, me and about 30 other people in the cooperative I run. Talk about a tough client!Still, it was a great opportunity to take my decades of design and packaging experience and focus it on something I love: making wine. So I treated this client as a real client, starting with a brand articulation and then executing it through a rigorous visual strategy – one ultimately featured in Communication Arts ... -
Health in Harmony: Annual Appeal
This is our sixth collaboration with Health in Harmony on its annual appeal. This year, the message was momentum and building on it. Our visual strategy was to balance a clean, modern composition (mirroring the top notch healthcare the organization provides) with the faces and textures of the population they serve. Too many families in the developing world face a tragic Catch-22: the only way to put food on the table today is to log and destroy the same forest they'll depend on tomorrow. Almost literally, they must saw off the same limb they're standing on. But faced with the tragic choice of saving their children or saving their forests, they have no alternative...
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Portland Leaf Day Campaign
After a disastrous launch of Portland's leaf removal program the year before – without explanation, the city started charging residents for a service that had always been free – the city asked my firm to relaunch, help explain and build momentum for the program. I renamed the program "Leaf Day," emphasized the value of our urban forest and, therefore, why Portlanders should invest in it. With designer Cat Cheng, I created a logo and identity for the program, and created all the program materials for the first year, including brochure, door hangers, a poster, and one of the best online resources about the benefits of urban forest on the internet.
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Lori Mason Design
Lori Mason is a skilled textile designer with an incredible eye for pattern and detail, and was looking to take her business to the next level. We helped her articulate what exactly that meant for her, and then created a web presence to take her there.
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Comic Touch UX/UI
User experience, user interface, brand strategy, and 64 cover templates for Comic Touch, an app from Plasq that puts "your life on a comic book cover!" Just point your camera at the funny near you. Swipe left and right to choose a cover design overlay that fits your situation, add witty repartee and graphics, texturize your look, and then share it with the world!