live. breathe. design.

your brand says a lot about who you are as a seller. you want your shop banner and profile pic to effectively convey your work or your message.

i recently had the privilege of working with fellow etsian and Homespun Society member, Kornelia of Made by Sunflower, on her shop brand. Kornelia creates beautiful, and very detailed handmade jewelry. she wanted a banner and profile pic that accurately reflected her product.

BEFORE:

you will note that the banner shows off her jewelry and also has a font that is elegant to coordinate with the style of Kornelia’s jewelry. one thing that i noticed here, and you see in a lot of banners is a size issue. banners are tiny (760 px x 100 px), this limits the details and font sizes you can use. the pieces of jewelry shown are beautiful examples of Kornelia’s work, however having the whole piece of jewelry pictured forces the image to be so small that it does not show off all of the beautiful details that make her jewelry so unique and beautiful. additionally you find the same problem with the font, in particular the tag line, it’s size and background imagery make it difficult to read.

AFTER:

you will note that here we are still showing off her gorgeous jewelry, however by doing a detail shot you can really see all of the intricate work and beauty of the metals and stones together. here we still used an elegant font that compliment her jewelry, but in this case, we used it only on the main word of her shop title. this allows for it to be larger and more readable. having a complimenting font for the other words adds interest and allows for more space, making everything easier to view. the tagline is still printed in a small font, though now it is on a completely white/solid background which allows for it to be more legible.

we have also made a profile pic too coordinate with her banner, which you can see in the bottom left of the after photo. essentially whenever Kornelia is talking to someone on Etsy, they are receiving a subtle, but constant reminder of of her brand.

coordinating that imagery between your banner and profile pic, along with all of the social media you use to promote your shop, your email signatures, business cards packaging and invoicing, is a key part of creating a top of mind presence and a successful brand.

thank you so much to Kornelia for letting me use her shop for this comparison. please make sure to visit her shop to view her gorgeous selection of jewelry. great for a gift or a lovely piece for yourself

you can also “like” her business on Facebook and follow her on twitter. (and take a peak at how we coordinated these pages as well!)

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I offer both branding and shop design, some samples of my branding work can be seen on my website.

not only do i love to cook, but i love to read about cooking. i am also easily persuaded by an awesome food based photograph. in my opinion, creating a tasty meal is all about good design, from mixing flavors appropriately to plating the food in an appealing manner. food should always be beautiful. out there on the interwebs there is an overwhelming amount of food blogs – and while it is fun to explore them all, it can get overwhelming. in comes, tastespotting. i came upon this site, and find it so well designed and organized i had to share. plus, there is a ton of beautiful food photography filling every page. with recipes submitted from foodie blogs it is a great resource, search by category for recipes, roll the dice with the random button to be inspired or just look at all the beautiful food!

so for the past 2 weeks  i have been nothing if not addicted to watching the winter olympics. i just love the stories and all the energy and excitement.

while watcing i have been noticing the excellent branding throughout the event. i LOVE all the graphics.

the logo is well designed, incorporating the colors of the olympic rings. i enjoy that they used a character. he is also seen in sculpture (ice and rock) form throughout the venues. even more fun, his name is ilaanaq which is the inuit word for friend. a great term for inviting the countries of the world to compete together!

design wise i also love all the graphics at each venue, the blues, greens and whites are perfect and the illustrations are gorgeous.

the website is laid out in a clean and organized way, which makes it easy to find anything you are looking to read about. the branding and illustrations are incorporated in a way that makes sense and lend themselves to the organization of the site.

you may also notice the little cartoon characters incorporated on the web page. something new i learned this year is that each olympics has a mascot(s). in keeping with the other design, these mascots are illustrated beautifully, i LOVE their style and the characters!

new website design revealed! i designed this site to compliment the logo and business system i had designed for frank bogulski recently. (photos soon!)

the client wanted something, clean, professional, traditional yet with a bit of a modern feel. with so many attorney websites out there – having your site stand out and easy to use is important!

A few months back I shared a sneak peak at Casey’s website, when just the home page was up. The whole site is up and running now (with the exception of some sound clips) and you can check it out here.