Raffa's 2nd Birthday Invitations

It's only been a month since Raffa's birthday and party (oops! time flies) but I am finally sharing the fun invitations we sent out for his park party turned intimate rainy day at-home get together. I knew that I wanted to do hand-lettered invitations this year and the idea evolved in to a hand-lettered and illustrated set. On the front - the party details and on the back - illustrations of Raffa's most favorite things.

The party itself was a park and donut theme, which covered two of Raffa's favorites. The illustration on the back also included: Raffa's dump truck, his checkered Vans, his crayons, pancakes + syrup, Asher, Starbuck's iced green tea, his Finkelstein kitty, donuts, "coffee" (hot chocolate) from Huckleberry Roasters (the donut + "coffee" also cover Donut Monday, our weekly ritual at Huckelberry), his bunny, the park, his red trike, and reading books.

To accomplish the lettering and illustration, I turned to Shannon Snow. I have worked with Shannon several times and I was confident that she could bring my creative vision to life. I didn't want to do the lettering and illustration myself; I specifically wanted some one else to bring my ideas to life.

I paired the digitally printed, white and royal blue invitation with a small chartreuse, business card-sized enclosure with a photo of Raffa and an explanation that the invitation contained his favorite things. The mint blue envelopes were sealed with a custom return address sticker and some donut sprinkle washi tape. I hand addressed the envelopes and went with "From me to you" Forever stamps.

I had so much fun with designing these invitations this year!

See Raffa's birthday invitations from last year here.

Savory Institute Business Card Design

Last month I worked on these business cards under the creative direction of Sarah, Savory Institute's Director of Marketing and Communications.

The cards came as part of the non-profit's rebranding and new website launch. I really enjoy commercial work like this and have been focusing my lead generation efforts of late on capturing more work in the commercial space.

christmas cards 2014

My Octobers, Novembers, and Decembers are usually packed with holiday card designs. Each year I have plans of photographing each design, but in practice, time always slips away and I either don't get a sample of the printed cards or just don't take the time to have them photographed. With my family's cards, however, it is easy to get samples and have my sister snap photos of them. So inevitably, you can expect to find their's here on the blog and in my portfolio!

My mom desired a simple card this year, and she wanted the color photo to take center stage. That meant a simple type overlay of "MERRY CHRISTMAS" and our names on the front. On the back, a short note about the year's happenings and a couple more photos. The watercolor branch was originally meant for the front, but to allow the photo to shine (and due to all the foliage in the background of the photo), it worked best on the back.

My sister had a simple design in mind, too, incorporating some type and a diamond pattern. The dark green lettering complimented the greens and yellows in their gorgeous photo well. We went with a while envelope because we could not find a good source for dark, dark green ones (a first choice).

You can see more of my holiday card designs from years past here.

kane is one // birthday invitations, cake topper, banner, food cards

Inspired by Raffa's first birthday invitations, Tarika had me customize the invitations for Kane's first birthday party in San Francisco. In addition to invitations and return address labels, Tarika had me do some food table cards, a template for a banner, and a super duper cute cake topper.

It looks like this birthday party came together perfectly, and I love being a part of a special even such as a little one's first birthday party. My paper goods were beautifully complimented by the Golden Gate Bridge backdrop, and I would say they were over shadowed by the way-too-cute birthday boy!

Thanks, Tarika, for allowing me to share the photos from Kane's big day!

custom design // feather + barnwood baby shower invitations

One of my dear friends is pregnant with her third child, she is actually due literally any day! In May, I had the honor of designing a sprinkle (as opposed to a shower) invitation for a little celebration in honor of her. Although I was not able to attend because we were in California, I was so glad to make the contribution of the above invitation. I worked with the mama-to-be, Jenny, and she gave me some direction on the scripty/hand-written typeface and helped me refine the watercolor feathers. I also worked with another close friend of ours to round out the invitation in terms of the block font and she also gave me the idea for the barnwood background.

The invitation included the barnwood on the back as well, and was paired with purple envelopes that matched purple of "evely love."

I love the way the invitation turned out - especially those feathers on the barnwood. But more importantly, Jenny loved it too. I sure wish I had been able to be there at the celebration! And, I cannot wait to meet Miss Evely Love!

update: I just found out this morning that Evely has arrived! Yesterday she made her way into this world. Welcome, Evely!

custom design // manifesto

Along the same lines as this manifesto I did a while back, I just did this one about a month ago. These are totally fun and are a challenge at a whole new level beyond my REMEMBER the days. These are truly a typographic puzzle. They are tough and time consuming, but when it comes together and each puzzle piece fits, the result is so fun to see.

logo design // jamie hanley

Before my California trip I was working on and finishing up this logo for Jamie Hanley. I find her work, which combines psychotherapy and yoga to heal, fascinating. For her logo, she was very certain about what she wanted; the logo had a "must include list." That list included a lotus flower and that lotus flower had to be watercolor in style. She had also thought about wanting to go an inkblot direction, but once we started working on the design it was clear things could get way too busy if we included a watercolor style and an inkblot aspect to the design.

All of Jamie's must-haves came together as the final logo above and the nitty gritty of the brand is detailed below in the brand guidelines.

a little note: You also get a sneak peak at my new branding on the bottom of Jamie's brand guidelines. I am working on consolidating all of my businesses - freelance design, custom paper goods design, REMEMBER the days, etc. all under one more consolidated roof. It will mean a new website (chloemarty.com) instead of my existing hellotheredesign.com and I think it will just make more sense to have everything under me, as in under my name. I am almost done with the website, but it is kind of a backseat to other projects so I am totally not sure when I will actually finish it and launch it. Anyways, I have started using with clients and you get the sneak peek here!

hey!

Hey there! We are just getting ready for our trip to California. We are heading there for my sister's wedding and we will be gone for a little over a week.

I don't necessarily plan on posting here on the blog while we are gone, but I am not completely ruling it out either. I will certainly be Instagramming (so follow me @chloechristinemarty), and will hopefully have some great photos to share when we get back.

In the meantime, I wanted to say have a great weekend and I thought I would quickly share Raffa's first birthday party thank you notes. They match the theme of his party and have the same lettering as his invitations. I loved this goofy photo of him that my sister captured, so it was a perfect fit for thank you post cards to let everyone know that we really appreciated and enjoyed having them celebrate with us.

wedding invitation design // jonna + erik

I am so excited; we are heading to California for my sister's wedding. I already call him my brother-in-law, but technically he is not yet but will be as of June 12.

The wedding is a very intimate event. Immediate family only will be in attendance; so invitations were more of a tradition and keepsake than anything else.

My sister wanted a floral design with a watercolor style. The text was the other major element of the design, for which we combined several typefaces, a mix of a script/handwritten font and some modern block fonts.

The wedding will be part of a whole vacation that we are taking together. We will enjoy over a week in California wine country. We included a map with the invitation with the region we will enjoy; specifically San Francisco, Healdsburg, and Sonoma.

Since my sister got engaged years ago (yes, years), I had been waiting to design these wedding invitations for her. I finally got to and I am so thrilled with how pretty they turned out. And, as thrilled as I was to work on these invitations, I am even more excited to celebrate the marriage of my sister and brother-in-law all while enjoying a vacation with my favorite people.

raffa is turning one // first birthday invitations

Raffa's first birthday party is tomorrow! What an exciting milestone and such a fun party to plan. These are the invitations I designed for the event.

And now, the party is here! It is tomorrow. We are all ready for it! I did end up following this plan for his party; I even made that banner for the occasion.

I realize that Raffa may not remember his first birthday and its party, but all of us who love him are so excited to celebrate him!

The invitations were a simply black and white with lettering to match his banner - hand cut letters. I included a very appropriate enthusiastic photo of Raffa. The back of the invitation features a pattern of asymmetrical diamond shapes. I opted to have the envelopes hand lettered and then I made return address labels with the same hand cut lettering as the invitation.

So, let the celebrations begin! It all started yesterday with the start of the #raffasturningonegiveaway {don't miss it! it ends May 11th}.

bicycle baby shower

Our trip to Durango was absolutely fabulous. We had a lovely time and enjoyed some nice weather. I got to get some Durango running in, we went on a hike, and we just enjoyed feeling like we were "home" for a few days. The purpose of my trip, as I mentioned last week, was a baby shower for a dear friend. I co-hosted the shower with another best friend.

The shower had a bicycle theme (remember the invitation I shared last week) and I made various paper pieces of decor for our theme. In addition to the invitations we had cupcake toppers (that we actually used as sandwich toppers), food cards to identify the various food items (sandwich "flavors", beverages, etc.), wrappers for the chocolate bar party favors, some fill-in letters to the baby, and an 11x14" print that we had guests sign like a guest book.

My pieces were only a small part of the puzzle and the care and love that my co-host put into the shower brought everything together.

I am considering offering this whole bicycle theme baby shower package in my Etsy shop, but I am putting feelers out there to see if it something that would interest people. What do you think?

We are heading back to Denver today. Bittersweet, as usual, as I always feel most at home in Durango.  We likely won't have an opportunity to go back until mid-summer.

custom design // bicycle baby shower invitations

Raffa and I are headed to Durango tomorrow because I am co-hosting a baby shower for a dear friend of mine there. And, I thought I would share the invitations I designed for the shower today.

A navy, yellow, and gray bicycle theme is the direction we went with the invitations because that is the theme of baby Peter's nursery. The invitation was a simple design, with a hand script and modern block font, and a whimsical bicycle illustration, which will be carried over to several pieces at the shower (favors, food name plates, etc.). We went with gorgeous navy envelopes and yellow wrap around labels. Gray and white polka dot washi tape sealed the envelopes. For postage, we went with several smaller denominations for a fun look; the guy at the post office looked at me like I was crazy when I told him I wanted to do this. Ha!

I am so excited to be going to Durango; we haven't been since January and I am hoping for some lovely spring weather. We will certainly catch up with lots of friends, go to some favorite places, and hopefully get out on some hikes. My mom is coming with us, and so the three of us - Raffa, Mimi, and me - will spent Easter today; certainly a bummer not to be with the whole family for Easter, but I am sure we will have a lovely Easter in Durango.

By the way, these baby shower invitations are available for purchase and customization in my Etsy shop.

crystal springs brewery // rebranding

My John was working on a project for his marketing and operations classes as part of his MBA last semester. His group took on the case of Boulder/Louisville based brewery; assessing its operations and marketing strategy. Among other things, they identified the necessity of rebranding.

existing logo in use by Crystal Springs Brewery

Now, most would have no reason to know this, but John has an eye for design. I ask him to pursue this all the time - take on clients do not have the time to accept. He is that good. So, with a recommendation for rebranding, he went a step further and decided to show his "client" what that rebranding could look like. He worked up some logo concepts for Crystal Springs Brewery.

logo concepts designed by John Marty

John wanted to maintain the focus on the rich history of this brand, but give the logo more appeal. He ventured after a vintage-feeling logo as opposed to an antique one.

Now is the point he brought me on board. We selected one of the logos from the concepts he had drafted, refined it slightly, and said "this is it!". Typically the client would go through this process with the designer, but in this case John wanted to present the finished suggested rebranding to the client so we kept this process in-house, so to speak.

final logo in color variations

Next up we visited the packaging which was also identified as needing to be re-thought out. The existing packaging was found to be lacking in design appeal and also did not have a consistent design aesthetic.

Using our final logo, I took the helm and created some packaging mock-ups with the branding colors we had selected.

packaging mock-ups designed by John Marty and myself

Just as John went for a vintage feel for the logo, the colors we selected had a retro/vintage feel as well. In contrast to the existing packaging that has little consistency, we went for uber consistency here having each can follow the same mountainscape silhouette theme and just changing the brew style (i.e. IPA) and Crystal Springs specific name (i.e. "Marilyn").

This project was a lot of fun to work on for many reasons ... the industry and product are much different than my usual client. And, getting a chance to work with John really gave me the bug to work with him more - husband + wife design studio, yes please.