This book review comes from my other blog: http://laurapakora82.wordpress.com/

Information is Beautiful by David McCandless

I love this book. I bought it last year, and have flicked through it a few times, but this time I sat down and read it from cover to cover in depth. The information design in this book is gorgeous and inspiring, and I spent ages poring over the diagrams and illustrations.

There are diagrams on many different subjects, to the most popular baby names, to dictators wives… global warming to literature. It’s an interesting read as it is, even if you are not interested in the actual design side of the book, and because it’s a good design book, the information is laid out in a very well thought out way, making it easy to understand.

David McCandless, the author, describes himself as a “data journalist” or “information designer” and he designed this book to convey the facts and messages with the least amount of words, but the most amount of impact.

The thing that hit me most amount these info graphics, is how lovely they are, without context I would want to put them on my wall, with context they are just even more awesome! I found it very inspiring, I love information design, and this book (and the accompanying website) are an awesome selection.

I would definitely recommend this book to anyone who likes art and design, as well as anyone who wants an interesting fact book to dip into.

The Awards Ceremony for the South Devon Business Excellence Awards took place at the English Rviera International Centre on Friday night. It was a lovely event, lots of nice food, glittering lights and glasses of champagne…

I didn’t win my award – Young Entrepreneur, I was runner up. The winner: Sparkly Nails  was a worthy winner! The other businesses in my category were: Wedding Emporium and Cherish Jewellery.

It was an interesting night, meeting lots of different businesses and seeing how they have grown and work, as well as chatting to the girls from Outset Torbay – a business start-up organisation.

TTFN,
Laura

Just wanted to share with you thae article I found in the local page – complete with picture of me looking slightly uncomfortable about having my photo taken…

Herald Express - Young Entrepreneur Article

I’ll find out on Friday where I place, and will blog with some photos of the Awards Ceremony.

In the meantime, have a look at the other shortlisted companies, very impressive competition!

Shortlisted for the Young Entrepreneur Award

TTFN,
Laura

Well, here are the last few images from the sketchbook…

Prehistoric Technology Parade

A bit silly, but I enjoyed drawing these!

Prehistoric Flower

A bit more work on this idea…a combination of drawing and collage.

Tyrannosaurus

Sketch and collage, watercolour and pen, playing with the cassette tapes.

Wooly Mammoth

Same again with a wooly mammoth…

Well, I enjoyed this little project, although I wish I had put aside more time. I am now looking into entering the Limited Edition Sketchbook Project but it only gives me until April 30th… I was also a little disappointed with the paper, lots of my work showed through the pages, something I need to think about if I do this again!

I hope you have liked my images, you can see them all here on the Arthouse Co-op website.

TTFN,
Laura

I have been working with Devoncraft and ITQ9 for a while now on the new DCUK website. The previous website had grown with many new products, and it needed to be updated with the new brand colours and typography as well as trying to fit navigation to all the products above the fold.

Old DCUK Home Page

As you can see the navigation on the left hand side had grown so big it carried on down the page so that the user had to scroll to find all the different sections. We kept the colours, the pale beige and the brown, and updated the navigation to try and fit it all above the fold and on every page.

New DCUK Home Page

Along the top, the home banner is a slideshow of the welly ducks – not only does the style work well for this size and shape photo, these ducks are also the bestsellers. The photos were all retaken (by me) and use a white background as this not only works well against the neutral brand colours but also shows off the ducks at their best.

DCUK Gift Ideas Page

I designed the look of the site and worked in collaboration with ITQ9 to get the site up and running. We kept the type big and simple, and kept the text to a minimum where possible to ensure that the site is easy and pleasant to use.

Welly Ducklet

We tried to make it as easy as possible to order each product with the relevant choices and extras – we wanted to keep it similar to the previous site so we didn’t lose any customers, but make it better to use. I was then also able to tie in the new branding for the website into the print work and email newsletters:

Christmas E-shot

It’s still a work in progress but it’s looking a lot better! You can see more of the DCUK print work and e-shots on my website here. You can also visit the DCUK website at: www.theduckcompany.co.uk.

TTFN,
Laura

This is an ongoing project but I wanted to share with you all the work so far…

Essential Oils Direct approached me about a year ago to help them with some branding work for several different projects, which we’ve been working on. Argan Vie is an organic fairtrade Argan Oil product, at present the oil itself from the kernels of the Argan tree, found mainly in Morroco.

EOD asked me to design the logo and branding for this product, at first, just the oil itself but hopefully there will be some new products on the not so distant horizon. I looked at Morrocan art, the colours, style and patterns used, and at the tree itself and the kernels. I came up with a few different ideas:

Argan Vie Logo Ideas

I went for 3 different approaches, looking firstly at the patterns and shapes used in Morrocan art, and a mediteranean colour pallette. The second idea used the typography and the finials and counters of the a as a drop of oil. The third was more clinical and modern look at the brand.

We decided to go for the second option, and the final design for the logo was created:

Argan Vie Logo

I used a Modern Serif typeface – Bodoni, with contrast between the thick and thin strokes and thin straight serifs, as this is a very elegant typeface, and is often associated with beauty and fashion (think of Vogue magazine…) I went with lowercase as this made the brand slightly warmer and friendlier, and fitted with the use of the lowercase a as the logo.

We then set about designing the packaging, trying out different bottles and labels. The 50ml and 100ml bottles are silver coloured with a clear label over the top – the type looks lovely and crisp against the silver colour. The soap is just a band of cardboard, we are keen not to use too much packaging.

Argan Vie Oil, 100ml and 50ml, Argan Vie Soap

Close-up of Argan Vie Oil Bottle

Close-up of Argan Vie Oil Bottle

Argan Vie Soap Label

We’re still developing some newer products in the range, and more packaging, so watch this space for more Argan Vie! You can buy the oil here: Argan Vie and visit Essential Oils Direct here.

TTFN,
Laura

Only a few days to go before I package up the sketchbook and send it off on it’s way…

Here’s a few more pages from the latest work I have done:

Cassette Tape

More musings on cassette tapes, I have also gone back and painted some of my previous scribbles…

More Cassette Tapes

I have had a brief foray into records and gramophones…

Gramophones

And even looked at old phones…

Old Nokia

Although I think this bears an uncanny resemblance to a nun… is it just me? Then finally, the time came for me to put down my brushes, my pencils and my pens, and pick up the scissors and glue…

Prehistoric Technology Flower

More to come, as I fill the last remaining pages for the deadline, watch this space.

TTFN,
Laura

Just before Christmas, I entered the South Devon Business Excellence Awards. A friend of mine suggested I put the business up for one of the awards, and after a few days I thought, “why not?”

I entered for the Young Entrepreneur Award, and to be honest, didn’t think any more of it! Christmas came and went, and since the New Year I have been busy working on different projects, as well as trying to re-organise and re-decorate my office/studio and I had forgotten all about the awards. Then on Wednesday afternoon, I received an email.

I have been shortlisted along with 3 other companies for the Young Entrepreneur award, which will be announced at an Awards Ceremony on 10th February. I am absolutely over the moon to be shortlisted, and I’m looking at the Awards ceremony as a chance to treat myself to a new dress, as well as network with lots of other local businesses. You can see the article in the Herald Express here.

A quick update on the Sketchbook Project – I will have to wrap this up and send it back by the end of the month, so I thought I would post the work I did over Christmas…

Gameboys and floppy discs

More doodles and sketches of prehistoric technology – the floppy discs in particular seem like they might make a good pattern. Might have a play with this over the weekend on the computer…

Nokia... remember these?

The Nokia was so lovely to draw, took me back to my college days and technical drawings… I have also thought about something more abstract with the tapes, going to have a play with some paper and collage.

Really oldskool... anyone remember these?

My dad has a gramophone, and hundreds of vinyl records – and I love them. I have done some work with records before, so this was a bit of a revisit. Going to get the paints out and have a bit more of a play with these.

Hopefully I’ll get some time this week, and the weekend to have a bit more of a play with some of these ideas, and then it’ll be posted off back to the project by the end of the month!

TTFN,
Laura

Happy New Year! And what a way to start 2012… a competition!

My entries for the What’s your Type competition are now up and can be voted for. All you need to do is go to the Facebook Gallery and “like” an image – each “like” = a vote.

Here are my entries again to remind you:

c (image number 53)

Z (image number 54)

g (image number 55)

g (image number 56)

i (image number 57)

n (image number 58)

O (image number 59)

s (image number 60)

Z (image number 61)

So if you like them, please go and vote, and also check out all the other amazing entries and vote for them there too.