Photo from jennataylr

2012 has been a big year around here. The last half got so busy, it's hard to even remember what happened in the first half, but I'll give a shot at some highlights.

January saw BRFC products going on sale at Dots & Loops in Lunenburg, NS. It's an amazing looking shop, and I couldn't be happier to be selling there. My relationship with Dots & Loops also ultimately resulted in BRFC getting the attention of and then going on sale at Scout in Toronto. I'd been thinking of trying to get into a store in Toronto for awhile, and think it's funny that my Nova Scotia connection helped bring that around. Jenna and I got to visit Scout very briefly recently and I am dying to go back.

In April, I brought Aaron Draplin to town to give a talk. I've been following him for years, and was super excited to get to meet him and hear him talk. The fact that I made it happen myself made it even better.

In July we got our puppy, Finnegan. And everything kind of changed in various ways. It kind of became hard to figure out how to work everything in, but things are smoothing out.

In August, two of my favourite people got married to each other. I got to design and print their wedding invitations. I really enjoyed working on the project for them, and was very happy with how they turned out. And the wedding itself was amazing, of course.

In September and October, the Princess ran the design film series I've always wanted to book, which was really exciting to see.

 

Eventually we buckled down and got to work on new Christmas BRFC products for the winter Stitch n Kitsch sale. With new pillows, and banners, and lots of help from Jenna's mom, we ended up having our best sale yet, which felt really good.

And through all of that I was still working on posters and other stuff for all kinds of different people. The last part of this year became my busiest one yet, design-wise. A big part of that was that I received a number of requests for logo design work. Some of it just started coming out recently, so I'm really excited to get to share them...

The Grad House at UW renovated over the summer, and I was asked to work on a new logo for them. I have some fond memories of going to see bands play at the Grad House, so I was honoured to be asked to do this work for them. After a couple different ideas based on things we'd talked about, Henry from the Grad House asked me to do just one more, whatever I wanted, and this is what I came up with. Glad it ended up being the one.

While working on that, another of different projects came up. One of them was this design for local architect, Graham Whiting. It was a little scary to work on a redesign for a very personal business like this, but I had a good feeling that we had similar tastes, and was pretty optimistic about how it would all turn out. The circle is the primary mark we came up with, and in the end I put together the smaller, secondary mark to compliment it, as it can be handy to have the option for different applications.

As soon as there was talk of food trucks in Waterloo, I knew I wanted to design for one. That chance came up when my friend Brad decided to start Schmuck'n Gourmet/The Schmuck Truck. I designed the original Schmuck'n Gourmet knife/tomato logo, and it has since morphed into what you see on the truck. It just started making appearances around town, and it's pretty cool to see it out there. The food I've eaten off of it is great too!

Last but not least is the Taco Farm logo. I think it's still a little while before this guy really gets out there, but I am super excited about it. The people involved are awesome, and it's bringing tacos to Uptown. More to come on this one in the future, but I definitely had to mention it here.

I'm sure there's a tonne of stuff I've missed here, but it's an overview. A big year for sure.

Coming up in 2013, I should have more time away from my day job to focus on my own stuff. Look for bearface.ca to finally become a real site, BRFC products to finally return to etsy, possibly a whole new project, and whatever else gets thrown at me. Looking forward to all of it.

December 8 will mark my third winter Stitch 'n' Kitsch show. I'm pretty excited about it, and am working on some new products to sell at it as well.

I'm also pretty excited about the advertising I created for this show. It started with the postcard, up above. I created it (okay, actually a variation of it...) back in Spring. I was pretty happy with it right away.

Since then we kind of locked down the "Stitch 'n' Kitsch' wordmark. I'd made a few variations using these two fonts, as they fit into things, but we wanted something that matched to go up on the website, so I created a 'final' version of it to use in everything.

From the start I knew that for posters I wanted to expand on the idea of the postcard. At one of our meetings, someone suggested that for posters around town, instead of doing 11x17 posters, we use less paper and make 5.5x17 posters, two on one sheet. Instead of just making one poster, and doubling it up on a sheet, I made it into two matching posters, with all the same content, but 2 different birds on each.

Lastly we decided to run a movie-sized poster in the lobby of the Princess Twin (who got a new website recently!). Since there's so much space on one of those, I brought everything back together in one place.

And that's the whole thing. For now at least. I had an idea to make cards, each with a different bird on it, but I doubt that would happen in time for the show, it's really soon! Now I need to get working on having enough product to sell, and to get thinking about the identity for spring show, so we can start promoting it at this one!

Hope to see you there!

If you want to see more pictures of what I've been working on lately, check out my flickr page, or my instagram page. (There's lots of puppy pictures on the instagram page too...

New Babies

As you may already know, Jenna and I brought home a new baby into our home recently. Finnegan is a Bichon/Sheltie cross, and we love him, even when he's being crazy. He starts puppy school tonight, and he can already sit, fetch, and shake a paw, so I've got high hopes for being able to teach him even more.
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At work, my new baby is the aforementioned Art, Design & Architecture series. I've been wanting to put together something like this for awhile, and after the success of the Draplin talk I organized, John finally caved to it. I can't wait for it, 'cause it's all documentaries I'm dying to see. Lets hope other people are too, and it all turns out alright.

Most exciting to me of all is the film I'm presenting myself, Just Like Being There. As a gigposter designer myself, it was a natural fit for me to take it on. So, if you only make it out to one of the screenings, go to that one. But if you can, make it out to all of them, and buy a series pass, so your tickets are cheaper, 'cause all seats are $10 for these, whether you're a member or not.
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In the world of BRFC, I'm working on moving into paper goods. First up are these Hello Dolly postcards. Thanks to my good friend Celene, who asked me to do some sort of Dolly art for her, these postcards are now on sale at Dots & Loops in Lunenburg, and White Elephant in Hamilton. And, of course, from me at the next Stitch 'n' Kitsch.

The plan is for this to just be a start. Greeting cards should be coming soon. But it turns out a puppy eats up a lot of time, so there may be some delays...
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There also some new freelance babies that I should be able to share soon. Not sure what the clients' plans are, so I'll hold them back until I know what's up. I've been doing some work that I'm pretty happy with and proud of.

Marc has another comedy night coming up at the Princess Cafe, so it was time for another anthropomorphized microphone poster! Maybe the last in the series of posters, but certainly not the last comedy night, and maybe not the last in the series of posters. I loved this idea when I had it, but I'm still not totally satisfied with it. It needed to be finished though, and so it is.
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Slogging through my still back-logged Google Reader I kept seeing Bill Murray posters, and finally found out the were all for Please Post Bills at Gallery 1988. Awesome, awesome show.

Not surprisingly, DKNG threw down my favourite with William James Murray. So good.
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I got an email from White Elephant in Hamilton this week that they were running low on my hankies and wanted more. The most exciting thing about this is that it gives us an excuse to go and shop at White Elephant this weekend!

(Seriously though, the most exciting part is actually that they sell my stuff, because their shop is awesome, and it means I'm being sold alongside other awesome people like Jenna Rose and others.)
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And, here's another new product pic from Twitter. Yes, I finally have towels with bikes on them. At some point I need to do a bike graphic that's more true to what I ride, but this design obviously works better on hankies and these very classic style towels.

Finished that poster up above a week or two ago. Final version ended up having "and" instead of "with," between the two names, but I like the way "with" looked better, so that's what you get here. More Lost Type Co-op. They just dropped two new fonts this week, and they're definitely still killing it. So good.
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So much stuff going on! Lots of things to get ready for BRFC's first Stitch 'n' Kitsch as a full fledged member (like the little trees you can see in the background here). A new Cafe Comedy night poster is in the works, there's some Starlight stuff, some QSY stuff, and, of course, my day job. Really wish I just had the extra stuff to do. Maybe one day?

In personal news, I have to go to the dentist tomorrow morning. Cavities. Somehow I didn't go to a dentist for like 10 years, and no cavities were found. 6 months later I go to a new dentist and there are cavities. Bad dentist, or 6 months of terrible brushing?
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For awhile now my intention has been to go to Android with my next cell phone, but this monolith iPhone case/projector is giving me more reason to want an iPhone. Pretty awesome.
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Cabin Porn is a blog that instantly got added to my reader, and then immediately became one of my most looked forward to 'reads.' So pretty. I want to print in this place (and maybe nap upstairs...)
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Want. Fisher-Price A-Frame (also from Cabin Porn)
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Jenna showed me this amazing quilt. I may be biased because it is in our wedding colours, but it is pretty damn perfect. Definitely want.

Yup, still feeling busy. Thought I'd update so you can see what I've been up to, though if you follow me on Facebook and/or Twitter, you probably know about all of this.

Up above is the front and back cover I did for the 'Home' issue of WLU's Blueprint magazine. Pretty happy with it. I might have done something different if I had a little more time, but I had all of those little houses left over from when I did this coaster set and was happy to get to use them for something. On the back you'll find a house I lived in as a kid in Brantford, and our current house (the most boring of the bunch). The front is Jenna's parents' house. Definitely a home-y place.
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After a fairly successful Spring Stitch 'n' Kitsch sale, where I was asked multiple times about a business card, I finally made up some business cards. Heavy stock. I had them in time for the first Uptown Flea, which I participated in, on the first Car Free Sunday. I don't know if I'll sell at the next Car Free Sunday, I kind of want to check out what's going on!
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I finally did a 2 successful 2 colour print, of a line of poetry that's always stuck in my head. Sorry for the crappy Blackberry in my workroom photo. Sold one so far! At least it was a good training exercise for a big important print I'll be doing soon.
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Finally, on the home front, Ron and I rented a stump grinder and got rid of the stump from the apple tree we cut down over the winter. Pretty fun, and tiring, couple hours.
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Obviously there's been lots of other things done and not done since I last posted too, but that's a bit of it. Wedding planning needs to amp up soon and fast, so it may be awhile before I'm back on here.

Seems about time for an update. More than time, really.

Recently finished the above poster for Danny Michel at the Starlight. Danny loved it, which is awesome, and I've made a modified version for him to send to other venues as his tour poster. Pretty awesome to think that it'll be up in other cities.

I tagged a little self-promo on the bottom of that version, and since my blogger address would look kind of lame, and by etsy one wouldn't be appropriate, I finally bought www.bearface.ca and tagged that on there. It only links to here for now, but I've got plans. Just have to make time to enact them.
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Speaking of plans, my bike plans are finally almost finished. Just need some bar tape and I'll be done with working on it for now. Got some brakeless riding in there for a bit, but finally put a brake on, and really like riding with the additional safety. It was a little nerve-wracking riding brakeless...

Got out for a long-ish ride this evening, and loved it so much. After everything I read about riding fixed, I didn't think it could all be true, but it really doesn't disappoint. It's exciting to have a bike I'm excited about riding again.

You can check out a flickr set of pictures of my bike here.
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Trying to work on some new stuff for Stitch 'n' Kitsch. It's kind of scary soon. June 11. I've got enough ready to go, but I just wanted to go in with more... We'll see what happens.

Been pretty busy lately with various things. Bunch of Queen Street Yoga posters, some club posters (like that pretty basic 'artist photo' poster up above, not my favourite type of poster to do, but I try to make them a little interesting) and a new BRFC project or two in the works. I've been amassing a tonne of links to share, but just haven't gotten around to it...
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At work it's film guide time again. Time to flip through about 8 million images online. Always interesting to see what stands out in that time.

One of the films we're playing in March/April is the Oscar nominated Dogtooth. Sounds like a weird one, but one I'm intrigued by. LOVE this poster for it, though you won't see it in the film guide. I described the poster to my boss as ballsy. Ballsy to make a movie poster like that. It's more something you'd see for a concert. Just a simple image. Love it.

It's unlikely that we'll show I Saw The Devil, but I can't stop going back to look at this poster for it. Striking, for sure. No pun intended. Really love it. Makes all the other posters for it look like shit.

We showed Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives a few months ago, and I wish this poster for it had been making the rounds at the time, because it definitely would have made it's way home with me. Seriously, more of this please, film companies! Criterion has had some good covers done by Daniel Clowes recently, but more movie posters would be awesome too.
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And, just to burn off a couple more links that have piled up:

Want. (Ben Ong shared this on Google. LOVE.)

Neat. (I think Jenna sent me this)

AWESOME. (Super clever monolith art. Pretty sure this came from the amazing Coudal feed)

Finally updated the header on here. I've been meaning to for a while, but just finally got around to it. Sounds like most things with me.

Up there is one of my trivets spotted in action on New Year's Eve. Looks good peeking out there from under the dish, if I do say so myself. Anyway, happy new year and merry christmas and all that. The holidays were nice, but not relaxing enough, and I'm having some serious trouble getting down to work and being creative. I'm sure things will get back on track soon, but until then, links!
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More than 1000 dead birds fall from the sky. What?? What makes this extra sad to me is that the red-winged blackbird is my favourite bird. Sad.
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Speaking of birds, you may know we kind of favour bird images around our house. Jenna recently found these two different antique packaging items that I really need to keep an eye out for now (on top of this Hush-shak can I'm itching to own):

Ronson Oily Bird lubricant. Clever, clever use of the spout as beak. Love it.

Snow Bird Dust Mop Polish. So pretty.
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If I were a snowboarder, I'd probably want this HBCxBurton snowboard. It's like a Bay blanket on a board!
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I know this is a little late, but Black Thought throws down some beautiful vocals in this video of The Roots doing The Christmas Song. Multi-talented vocalist! Love it.
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Also a little late, is this article about the novelty industry struggling with creating glasses for NYE 2011. Some pretty ridiculous solutions there.

Dying for Christmas to be here. Need a few extra days off work, and an excuse to do nothing and not feel bad about it. I just spent a little over around 2 hours clearing our my Reader (only 27 unread items!!) and linking stuff here, and now I feel like I've wasted too much time... Oh well.
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Just realized I haven't posted pictures of our table at Stitch 'n' Kitsch yet. There's one up above. Click it to see it big. Sorry for the ugly background, there was stuff going on behind us, AND we were freaking out and making a mess of our own stuff trying to set up.
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It was weird and exciting to start viewing this beautiful video that I came to from a link by Coudal, and hear music made by friends of mine as the soundtrack. Same thing happens every time I hear them in a Ford commercial too...
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Olly Moss totally killed it on these Star Wars posters, as he often does.
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Czech postage stamps. Some pretty awesome stuff in there. Highlights for me come all in row: Anniversary of TV broadcasting;  Anniversary of Radio broadcasting; Workers and banner; Factories and Rising Sun.
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I haven't bought into the whole selvedge jeans thing, but I love this guy, Roy, and his one-man made jeans. That's hard work and commitment. I can respect a $275 price tag on a pair of jeans that one guy put that much work and soul into. I think I'll stick with my 50-ish dollars a pair Levi's at the rate of about 1.5 pairs a year though. I don't make $275 jeans money, yet.
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I wish I was into playing guitar enough to justify spending $45 on a strap. I would definitely buy this Couch x Timber one. A guitar strap with bearded dudes, tree stumps and crossed axes? Yes, please!
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A little creepy but an interesting development. BMW uses afterimage to brand their logo in viewer's minds.
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Frequently I wish we had a fireplace or wood stove, for the warmth, and smell, but also for the excuse to chop wood. Now I specifically wish we could have this stove, because it looks awesome, and is super efficient.
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I wish I was friends with Matt Stevens, so I could have a copy of this limited run Air Max 1 a day book. I love this series of illustrations, and it looks pretty sweet in book form.
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I don't think I've linked to this yet, and I can't believe. This Delorean external hard drive could just be the best thing ever to store your Time Machine back-ups on. Seriously. Amazing. Clever. Detailed. Awesome.

Somehow I'm always busy at Christmas-time. We recently streamlined film guide production at the Princess, so theoretically I should be less busy than other years at this time. But then BRFC had a really great day at Stitch 'n' Kitsch, and at the same time Bon Mot opened in Uptown Waterloo and started selling our stuff. So suddenly we were out of stock on pretty much everything (a good problem, I know), and I've been relegated back to the basement in my free time, printing up more stuff.

I can't really complain though, I'm still loving doing it, and the response we're getting is pretty amazing. For going from not doing this at all a few months ago, to knowing that something I've printed is in someone's house, or is being given to a friend or parent as a gift, or is even on someone's Christmas tree, this is all pretty cool. BRFC has even been mentioned on two blogs recently, which you can see here and here. It's so cool to see the stuff in other peoples' homes!

Long story short, I haven't been posting because I've been busy. But I'm so happy being busy because everything going on right now is awesome. If you've bought something from BRFC, I really have to thank you, because you've helped to make this an amazing year.

Enough blathering. Here's some links...
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From Andre in Jenna's office: Flamingo's gather in the shape of a flamingo. Seriously!?
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In case of holiday emergencies: Altoids tin martini kit. I don't drink martini's, or mixed/shaken drinks much at all, but this is a great idea.
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1987 Nissan Pao concept car. LOVE it.
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R2D2 headphones. Pretty awesome. Not for me though. I'm kinda thinking of buying a pair of these though. What I find annoying is that I like the look, but I don't know if I want noise canceling. I use my headphones mostly at work, and kind of need to hear other people around me at the same time.
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It's kind of lame that this is done by Buick, and the conversation is pretty awkward, but this video makes me pretty excited about the idea of visiting Chicago. Good thing that two people I love are moving there soon!
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I LOVE this Arcade Fire poster. This one too. The problem? I'm not a huge Arcade Fire fan, so the idea of having a poster of theirs up feels a little weird to me. This actually happens to me a lot. Particularly with Andrew Bird posters. So many nice ones out there, but I've never even really listened to him! Conflicted!
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And now I've eaten up too much of your time. I keep meaning to post more, shorter posts. And then I don't.

Things are moving along at BRFC. Getting real close to Stitch n Kitsch on December 4, and I'm getting real anxious about getting everything done that I want to have done for then. Got a prototype made of a new product on the weekend, now we don't know if we can get the material to make them or not! Still soldiering on though. Only thing to do, really. Just finished a new coaster design that's totally pandering to a specific market we're expecting to see at the show, let's hope they like it!

That's the poster for the upcoming show up there above. Designed by Sheila, who you can find over here.

I have to say, I am SUPER excited to be selling at an SnK show for the first time.
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Some items of mine recently got featured by people I don't know, which is exciting. On this blog here, and in this etsy treasury here. Lots of views on my stuff now! Nice to know people at least like looking at my stuff online!
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Art of Manliness meets Etsy in this storque guest curator spot. My kinda stuff. (unfortunately, none of my stuff though... somebody else's handkerchiefs at least.)
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Talking to your kids about Star Wars. An excellent PSA. Lots of things to think about when you have kids. How young is too young to see the original trilogy? 'Cause it would be nice for them to see before they get all tainted by the school kids and the new stuff...
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Cookie Monster auditions for SNL. I know this is all over the place, but I had to re-link. Gotta support the Muppets.
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I want to go to here!

When Marc recently ordered a bunch of coasters from me for the Princess Cafe, he asked me to make some with a projector on them. I've been working on how that would look, and I'm pretty sure that the image above is going to be the end result. I hope it ends up printing okay.

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Started off today with some design work for a yoga teacher in Guelph, and a viewing of Vanishing Point. Spotted this production company logo in the opening credits which apparently somebody else also thought was cool, since they put it up on youtube. Simple and awesome.
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The more I see of the design for Frank, in Austin, the more I LOVE it. Seriously, it's making the rounds and it is awesome. Check out this run down that The Dieline posted. Really, really nice stuff. Thorough too. I love how they even went to town all over the outside of the building.

Actually, a number of things designed by the firm behind it, Helmsworkshop, have come to my attention of late, and they are putting out some amazing stuff all around. For example, go here and pay special attention to the Optimistic Beverages logo. Forget that, just look at everything on there. Nice stuff.
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These might be the cutest bird-feeders I've ever seen. Too bad I've only seen them for 99 euros. That's a little much for me!
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Shepard Fairey, and other people, have designed manhole covers in Milan? Awesome.
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Dueling Bears by BoyGirlParty. This print is adorable. I've seriously probably looked at it once a day for the past week or two.

I'm really holding it down with being inconsistent with my blogging. Honestly, I've been pretty busy all around. Lots of work being done outside of work lately, like those two posters up above, and printing items for brfc.etsy.com and the upcoming Stitch 'n' Kitsch show on December 4. The posters each reference something different that I'm a big fan of; Saul Bass & toggle switches. I have been tweeting a fair bit lately, so if you want to know what's going up with me personally, check out the feed up there on the right.

If you've been looking for links to stuff I like, sorry! Here are some for you now though.
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It Would Have Been Cooler as a Van. Classic movie vehicles re-imagined as vans. Awesome. So hard to pick a favourite, but I pretty much have to pick the Back to the Future Delorean any time I get the chance.
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History of video game consoles. Thorough. Seriously. Like, so thorough I've barely even started to look at it. Excited to slog through the whole thing when I have some time (so, never?).
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Apple: Their tablet computer history. More thorough, nerdy chronicling of techno-history. Another thing I'm excited to read through...
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Heroes of Folk. Love these. Love the classic American folk hero stories.
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Jack Purcell mids in melton wool? Yes please!
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10 reasons to grow a beard. As if you needed one.
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CBC 75th anniversary logo. Nice.
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The evolution of the geek.
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That's enough for now! Maybe more sometime?

It's hard, in all good conscience, to call the above picture 'the saddest picture ever,' considering all the  pictures out there of war, and genocide, and whatnot, but damn if it isn't one of the saddest pictures ever, for me at least. Been feeling the desire to watch Big Bird sing "It's Not Easy Being Green" again, but I don't know if I'm up for that kind of crying, yet.

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It occurs to me that I don't think I mentioned it on here, so hopefully you heard me blather about it elsewhere, but this weekend we had a table in a craft show for the first time ever. I've been screenprinting handkerchiefs, coasters and trivets in our basement for awhile now, and we're starting selling them under the name BRFC (BeaRFaCe). The sale this weekend I was viewing as sort of a test run, and it went really well. So I'm projecting an Etsy site launch of Oct 16, and am writing up my application (and then printing my arms off if I get in) for the winter Stitch n Kitsch show. I uploaded some pictures of the BRFC table to flickr, that you can see here. Super proud of it right now, and thankful for everyone who bought something this weekend and said nice things, and especially for Jenna, who is a BIG part of BRFC, and has pretty much all the best ideas related to it, which helps me get down to the business of printing.

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In other stuff I'm involved in news, my good friend Marc just took over the Princess Cafe from my boss at the Princess Cinemas. Though many things are staying the same, Marc's doing some redesigning this weekend, including new menus and other paper goods that I got to throw together for him. Really just an update on the old stuff, but I'm looking forward to seeing how it looks! Long story short, go to the Princess Cafe this week and support Marc!!

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Maybe things will slow down soon, and I'll get back to sharing links with you. I was excited last night to get my Google Reader below 300 unread items, so you can see I'm a little out of the loop right now...