I’ve recently been hard at work collaborating on a project for a non-profit organization called The Choir Project.  Founded by Dr. Marian Dolan, The Choir Project’s mission is to “build community chorally” in southwest Florida. The Choir Project’s latest event, Finding a Voice,  demonstrates this mission by organizing a choral & arts concert to benefit the Shelter for Abused Women & Children in Collier County.

I first met Dr. Marian Dolan back in September 2009 at a Social Media Club of Southwest Florida meeting and then again at another SMCSWFL meeting 2 months later. At our second meeting, she approached me about donating some design work to help promote the upcoming concert. I was happy to be a part of such a moving project to help such a worthy cause. We decided first to create a logo and brand for the The Choir Project and use the website and Facebook to promote the Finding a Voice concert event.

The first step was to create the logo. After discussing color and typeface preferences with Marian, I set about coming up with an icon to accompany the text. The design chosen to represent The Choir Project includes a mark that uses multiple trebel clefs rotated to create a circular design.

The next task was to create a website and blog. I decided right off that Wordpress was the best framework upon which to build the site. Wordpress is of course, a superb blogging platform and also has amazing plugins and widgets to enhance the appearance of the site. Using Wordpress as my framework, I then decided to try the Thesis theme to implement the blog design. I was immediately impressed with what you can accomplish with the Thesis theme both through the design interface and the use of the custom.css file. With the use of a couple of plugins (NextGEN Gallery and WPaudio) I was able to add a photo gallery of the Shelter’s Healing Arts Program as well as audio clips of the songs that will be featured in the Finding a Voice concert. Once the Facebook Fan Page was created, I created a Fan Page Badge to insert on the site’s sidebar. The last step was adding the link from Brown Paper Tickets so that tickets to the event could be purchased online.

Even though parts of this project are still in progress, I can say without a doubt that it has been a very rewarding experience. I’m thrilled to be a part of this fantastic project. I hope you join me for the Finding a Voice concert-for-a-cause at 4pm on January 31st at Moorings Presbyterian Church.

To learn more about The Choir Project or the concert, visit www.thechoirproject.org.

Many women, especially in southwest Florida, wear hats or sun visors to protect them from the sun while boating, playing golf or going to the beach. Lori Taylor, who is one of those active southwest Floridians, developed Visor Versa out of necessity to coordinate her visors depending on what she was wearing. She figured out how to create visors with interchangeable straps of all colors, patterns and sports teams and even has the ability of customizing straps for special events. Blue Turtle Graphics was hired to create the logo, packaging cards and website for this fun new product.

The logo was designed to have a “whimsical” and boutique look and feel, using a fun script typeface (House Industries Studio Swing) and red/chocolate brown color combo. Once the logo was finalized, we moved on to the packaging. Since the visor and straps were to be packaged separately, a fold-over card was created for each and then stapled to a cellophane bag. The cards have a small hole drilled so they can be displayed on a peg board in a retail store.

To get started online, the client wanted a one-page web site that had photos, product description and contact information. She wanted the ability to eventually sell the visor and straps online. With this in mind, the web page was built on a Wordpress framework for flexibility. The online store can be added with an ecommerce plugin at a later time as well as the addition of a blog.

We were thrilled to have gotten to work on such a fun and creative project and look forward to following Visor Versa’s success.

We recently had a client request to create a new ad campaign for them. Regenocyte Theraputic, a world leader in Adult Stem Cell Therapy, had previously been using a great ad concept but it had become a little stale and overused. They needed a fresh, new perspective as the basis of their advertising campaign.With the help of a great copywriter, we were able to produce a compelling new campaign using the concept, “Regenerate hope. Regenerate life. Regenerate you.” Each ad emphasizes the word’s “hope”, “life” and “you” while encouraging potential patients that they can be who they once were as well as do things they haven’t been able to do since the onset of their disease. The ad campaign is currently running in eBella Magazine, Southwest Florida Health & Wellness, Valacious Magazine and Life Extensions Magazine.

We’ve also recently designed several logos. One of the logos was for Coastal Cases, an iPhone and Blackberry case and accessories online store . Since the company is local to southwest Florida and aptly named “Coastal” we went for a look of palm tree and waves. Coastal Cases new website www.coastalcases.com  is currently in production and is being designed by White Crossroads.

Another logo design recently completed was for The Choir Project. The Choir Project provides local residents of various ages and ethnicities the opportunity to sing together – to build community – by offering innovative choral events, workshops, festivals, concerts, and short-term choral projects. I was approached by founder, Dr. Marian Dolan, at a recent Social Media Club of Southwest Florida meeting about donating some design work (logo, web, etc.) for the non-profit organization.  I was more than happy to design the logo as well as redesign the current website (coming soon!).  As part of the logo and web design for The Choir Project we are working to promote an upcoming concert in January to benefit the Shelter for Abused Women and Children. Stay tuned for the website launch and information about the Finding a Voice benefit concert!

I recently spotted this game on Bryan Yerkes and Grace Smith’s blogs.  Apparently, it was started by Mr Tim Van Damme. You go to the address bar in your favorite browser, and type one letter. Start with “a”, end with “z”. It seems to work best using Safari on a Mac (rather than using Firefox). I thought it looked fun, so here’s my version:

A: http://www.apple.com/ (yes, I’m addicted to Apple things)

B: http://www.blueturtlegraphics.net/

C: http://www.campaignmonitor.com/ (my favorite e-mail marketing tool)

D: http://www.davidairey.com/ (wonderful source of information on logo design and branding)

E: http://edison.edu/

F: http://www.facebook.com/

G: http://www.gracesmith.co.uk/

H: http://www.houseind.com/ (recently purchased some new typefaces)

I: http://ipinfo.info/netrenderer/

J: http://www.jupiterimages.com/

K: http://www.kristarella.com (Aussie blogger/designer/photographer and Wordpresser)

L: http://line25.com/ (love Chris’s site…great resource for designers)

M: http://mystudiohbl.com/ (my hair stylist’s site)

N: http://www.nikibrown.com/index.php

O: http://www.outlawdesignblog.com/

P: http://www.pearsonified.com/

Q: http://quotesondesign.com/

R: http://redheadwriting.com/ (a fiery redhead who’s a great blogger)

S: http://www.shutterstock.com/ (my favorite stock photo site)

T: http://www.thegridsystem.org/

U: http://www.uncommongoods.com/ (very creative gift ideas)

V: http://www.veer.com/ (I like their typefaces)

W: http://www.w3.org/

X: http://www.xmarks.com/ (keeps my bookmarks in sync)

Y: http://www.yahoo.com

Z: http://www.zombieland.com/ (don’t ask…)

There you have it. Please share yours!

Blue Turtle Graphics recently launched the redesign of Benchmark General Contractors website. In addition to redesigning their site, we also created a logo design for their new eco-friendly residential development on Sanibel Island. The community’s name, which was created by PKE Marketing & PR Solutions, reflects the colored sea glass found on the beaches of Sanibel Island. Sea glass is glass that is found along coastlines that have been tumbled and smoothed by water and sand, creating beautiful frosted glass of varying colors.

Sea Glass of Sanibel Island is a community of 12 single-family homes that is a collaborative effort between Benchmark General Contractors, the Florida Community Design Center (FLCDC) and the University of Florida School of Architecture. The design focus of this community and it’s homes will be to create an environmentally sensitive and eco-friendly neighborhood that can be used as a model for future development of coastal communities. For more information about Benchmark General Contractors and Sea Glass of Sanibel, visit www.benchmark-gc.com.

Blue Turtle Graphics is thrilled to launch the redesign of a client website. Benchmark General Contractors has been creating beautiful and quality residential and commercial buildings since 1984. They have also been committed to delivering new and renovated projects that are environmentally sensitive.

Since many new wonderful things are on the horizon for Benchmark (including a prototype sustainable community of single-family homes on Sanibel Island), they decided to update their site to reflect the modern technologies and eco-friendly methods they employ for building. Benchmark’s previous web site was several years old and needed an update both visually and technically. For better brand exposure,  we moved their logo to the upper-left side of the header, where it previously was hidden. We also added new features such as photo galleries, a blog (coming soon), a News section for recent press releases and a page called Green Initiatives which shows their dedication to energy-saving practices. Another new feature of the site is a Client Login area so their customers can access recent photos and progress reports for their projects.

The new site is a collaborative effort between Blue Turtle Graphics (design, xHTML, CSS), PKE Marketing & PR Solutions (PR and copywriting) and Gary Sharp (PHP programming). Check out the new Benchmark web site today and let me know what you think!

Benchmark web site - Before redesign

Benchmark's web site - After redesign