The Cell Pack eBay store had several great things going for it already – it was eye-catching, clean & informative. And while it visually pointed out all their products, services & features, there was a wonderful opportunity to expand upon their success by streamlining the navigation experience for buyers.

Cell Pack was looking to continue their clean, friendly look by building a strong brand. They wanted to convey the company’s professionalism while promoting their always-helpful & available approach to customer service.

Designing for Cell Pack Solutions was going to great fun. Their product line is bold, powerful & electric. All strong concepts that would best be visualized with a heavy-weight typeface & impactful colors.

Using the company’s existing color scheme of red & blue, I slightly toned the colors in order to reduce eye strain and brought in various shades to compliment the overall look. We even experimented with a completely different color-scheme of orange & green to see if a change in direction would further help convey the sense of electricity & power.

“Working with Jennifer has been an absolute pleasure. Without too much input from ourselves, Jennifer understood our market sector and created a fantastic design relating to it. We are thrilled with our new eBay store design.” – Kris Hayes

While the overall design is somewhat a departure from my portfolio style, I really enjoyed the challenge of ensuring clean, easy, user-friendly navigation that promoted all their products. And working with Kris Hayes at Cell Pack Solutions was a wonderful experience. Always friendly, always prompt – a true representation of a great company.

Happy Sales & Best Wishes to Cell Pack Solutions!

Visit their store at:

DESIGN PACKAGE: eBay Expansion Store Design – logo design, custom storefront home page, accompanying content & About Me page, matching auction template & custom promotional graphics.

The logo itself was strong – clean typography & perfect shade of china blue. And Cindy was excellent in her attention to detail in everything from her about me page to auction descriptions.

But she was looking to expand upon all that. She wanted a custom landing page (storefront) that had easy navigation for potential buyers, wanted to highlight her newsletter & really take her professional appearance up a level.

Because her focus is hard to find dinnerware replacement & fine china, I wanted the design to convey the feel of a high-end tea room, delicate lace & trim and the soft feel & look of porcelain. Because her business passion stems from her grandmothers’ china, I wanted to pull in that personal, family touch.  And I couldn’t resist the great marketing opportunity of including her beloved dog, Dobby, who is the silent business partner.

Her existing blue was wonderful, but it needed softening. The sharp blue against the stark white, while crisp was just a bit stressful on the eyes – trying to adjust between the two opposing values. So I looked to the tones of float blue china patterns with touches of gold filigree for her color palette.

“One of the most positive design experiences I have ever participated in.  Jennifer is a highly gifted artist, an incredibly patient person and mostly likely a mind reader.  She made it so easy and I am completely delighted with my new eBay Store design” – Cindy Schreiber

I loved the challenge of this design & working with Cindy was great. I couldn’t be happier with the final outcome & I’m looking forward to seeing her enter the store in the 2009 eBay Store awards.

Happy Sales & Best Wishes to Candabean Collectibles!

Visit her store at: http://stores.shop.ebay.com/Candabean-Collectibles

DESIGN PACKAGE: eBay Expansion Store Design – logo design, custom storefront home page, accompanying content & About Me page, matching auction template & custom promotional graphics.

After offering various products, Diana settled on a specific line – cowboy boots & other leather accessories. And while her store at the time was bright & eye-catching with it’s vibrant red & soft pink, it wasn’t sending out the right message for her new Western-style brand – a mostly male demographic.

So when Diana came to me, her goals for a new look were clean, earthy & friendly – something that made it easier for buyer’s to navigate around, something that was eye-appealing & increased consumer confidence.

There are so many ways to design a western-theme, but the trick was going to be how to walk the line between the stereotypical cowboy look & the pinned-in vintage feel. She needed a clean, more modern approach to western life while staying true to it’s roots.

So the design inspiration came from her own company tag line – ‘Western Wear for the Everyday Cowboy & Cowgirl’. Everyday cowboy, that was the key. So I pulled in the colors of hay bales, prairie grass & tanned leather.

Wow!  I’m impressed. Jennifer has done it again. Another wonderful and very creative work of art. I’m very pleased with the way she can put together something from nothing and make it work. She is so easy to work with. My new look is fantastic, I love it. Thank you Jennifer!

I really enjoyed working with Diana & am happy to know we’ve created a brand image that she both loves & conveys the right message.

Happy Sales & Best Wishes to Bubbe’s Boots & Leather

Visit her store at: http://stores.shop.ebay.com/Bubbes-Boots-And-Leather

DESIGN PACKAGE: eBay Expansion Store Design – logo design, custom storefront home page, accompanying content & About Me page, matching auction template & custom promotional graphics.

Last weekend my husband & I took went on a tour of the local Buddhist temple.

(Well, a do-it-yourself-there’s-no-tour-guide-&-no-English-anywhere tour that would’ve been so much better had I known more about it while we were there.)

So what follows is the research I’ve been able to dig up on Silleuksa Temple now that we’re back home & back at work.

It’s the only river-side temple in all of South Korea & it’s also one of the smallest.

The buildings are nestled high-up in the rock face of the Namhan River…so it’s a bit of a climb in certain spots.

The temple had already been in existance for some time when it was first documented in 1376 & some estimate it was first built in the 800’s.

Like all things ancient, it’s been built, burned, re-built bigger, burned again, re-built even bigger yet again & rededicated several times over.

It’s an active temple…monks & nuns live here, worship here, hold services here.

Looking up at the roof beams you can feel the weight of this building’s age.

The paint’s become very faded…you can see exposed wood drying & splitting in some spots…but the faint outlines of the geometric shapes are still there.

(I wonder if they’ll repaint it…or leave it as is?…If you were the conservator, what would you do?)

I have no clue what this building is named…or it’s exact purpose….or it’s exact age. It just looks like a large, open prayer hall to me.

As a graphic designer, I’m just amazed by all the lines, the curves…the colors…the designs.

The building seemed empty for the moment…although there was a monk here & there walking back & forth.

But look inside…even the ceilings are ellaborately decorated & designed.

When I made my way around to the back side of the building, I spotted him…

…working away.

I think he was scraping paint off the doors.

Maybe they are going to repaint everything afterall.

I just love this shot – I think it’s my favorite so far. But you should’ve seen me trying to take it.

Focus on him…fudge, he sees me…turn away quickly….pretend to look over there…try to sneak back…careful, carefull…now, quick! Re-focus on him…fudge it!

I did this dance about 2 or 3 times before I finally snagged this one.

I just really wanted to catch him in the moment – not some ’smile-for-the-crazy-American-lady’ posed shot.

I wonder what he must’ve thought of me.

I’m so happy to announce the new look of Irwin Street Mercantile – an up & coming, soon to be PowerSeller out of Hanford, CA.

After having her store open for 5 years, Kathy Frappier, Irwin Street’s great owner, decided to take her store to the next level.

She started by enrolling in the success classes offered by Janelle Elms and decided it was time to get serious about her business & update the look.

While she had a step-up on the average seller with a unique color palette & logo, Irwin Street was in need of a make-over.

Knowing that Kathy wanted to keep the vintage feel, my approach to her design was the rustic appeal of the old-time mercantiles – creaky wooden floors, bushels & barrels of produce for sell with products crammed in every nook & cranny of floor to ceiling shelves. We even incorporated a picture of her grandmother to help convey the sense of family.

We played-up the mercantile theme by using custom graphics to showcase her current sales, promote her newsletter & highlight her combined shipping policy.

Kathy’s response to this initial concept was,

“WOW!!!  You have exceeded my expectations as I knew you would!  I think you’ve done a fantastic job of capturing the Mercantile feel. My first thought was that I’m going to have to get better stuff to put into my store to match how cute my design is!”

I couldn’t be more proud of the design & I’m so thrilled to know that Kathy loves the new look so much.

Best wishes to a wonderful & dedicated eBay store owner! Be sure to visit her site at:

http://stores.shop.ebay.com/Irwin-Street-Mercantile

Three years ago today, Boo left my life.

It was the most difficult decision I’ve ever had to make, but her organs were failing & I couldn’t watch her continue to be in pain. She had battled illness for the last year of her life & the time had come.

She was just a lazy house dog…

…who loved to run on the sand…(she was allergic to grass).

She loved to snuggle with stuffed animals…

…and cuddle with Kitten…

and go anywhere & everywhere with me….just to be with me.

I miss my sweet girl.

One of life’s quirks in Korea is no hot water. Nope, no wonderfully warm water to come rushing out of the faucet the minute you turn it on. No warm water for your bath, to wash your face, do some quick dishes, nada.

Here you have to push a button.

They don’t use hot water heaters – although I’m not exactly sure what the process is called. All I know is that it takes oil. Oil we just paid $216 US for last week that’s supposed to last us 6 months.

So in order to take my morning shower I had to walk downstairs & push the little button our real estate agent labeled in English for us. (I don’t know what the other buttons are for – I don’t think she ever told us.) I’m sure they’ll be important come winter because if I remember right this place has heated floors – our only source of heat.

Then it’s walk back upstairs, wait for the water to get warm & climb in the shower.

The problem with this process is remembering to go back downstairs immediately afterward to push that little red button. I just noticed (at 2:30pm) that we never turned it off this morning. Crap!

Maybe I should put a sign in the bathroom to remind us, or at the bottom of the stairs.

The irony to all of this is that when we do turn the faucet on & realize there’s hot water coming out of it, we immediately remember we should’ve turned it off before.

Korean Life Lesson #1: Always turn the hot water off.

Here is a perfect example of excellent brand management.

Coca-Cola has had the same logo since 1885. Did you know that?…

Because they invested in a quality logo from the start – and kept with it, even when the fashions changed - it’s become iconic. Sure, the advertising campaigns may have changed over the years, but the logo hasn’t.

And that’s why no matter where you go, a Coke is a Coke…even in a tiny teriyaki shack in little-bitty Anjung-Ri, South Korea.

The Design Studio has officially been relocated to Anjung-Ri, South Korea! As far as how successfully, well…that’s another story.

But first, I cannot begin to thank everyone enough for all their understanding, well wishes & support of my decision to join my husband at USAG Humphreys.

Shortly before the move to Korea, my laptop died…with no apparent hope of salvage. And with no time to either address the issue or replace the machine before the long flight, I was left dead in the water & could only hope that I would be able to revive it after my arrival.

While I was able to retrieve all the SittingBoo client files, it would appear I’ve lost all my Outlook & project management files.

The hard drive has been sent to a clean-room in Seoul where they can pull apart the hardware to attempt to retrive the data.

The blessing in this is that while this would have been an expense of hundreds, if not a thousand or two, in the States – here in Korea it will only run $200 US. So I should receive the final verdict on the file retrieval early next week.

In the meantime, I’ve ordered a new laptop & I’m using my husband’s computer to access email. I’ve also replaced the software I need to create graphics & HTML code and installed it on his machine so there will be no further interruption for client work.

I believe I have reached out to every active client prior to sending this announcement – but if you have not heard from me, please contact me as soon as possible so that I can review your current project status with you!

Be sure to stick around – this blog will allow me to share the more interesting aspects of life in Korea, our dog Maggie Moo’s latest antic – as well as information about design, branding, contests & giveaways, client spotlights – not to mention tips on how to prevent a computer crash of your own!