This is somewhat derivative of the last poster I designed for Firecracker Jazz Band, but we needed one for our weekly performances at Olive or Twist so I came up with this design. Whipped this out in about an hour.
There’s a new club opening up in Asheville, the Arcade Asheville, in the location of the old and much mourned Joli Rouge and they are planning to have raging dance parties every Friday night. For a dance party to rage, you need the right DJs and they landed the best in town. By best, I mean with the best taste and widest appeal. They got Marley and my good friend Par. I’ve worked for Par’s former project, Under One Beat Productions, and designed lots of posters and other documents for them. So he called me up and said he found the best image ever to use as the basis for a poster. And he’s right, this photograph is dope. Super dope. It inspired this design.
Been trying to beef up the ol’ portfolio lately, and this was just the sort of project I was looking for.
Speaking of that, you should check out my portfolio.
Good friends Screaming Js, the house band at MoDaddy’s, needed a poster to help with some promotion. So they asked me to put something together, and this is what I did. I tweaked the type (I used Blackmoor) and stole the piano from the 1902 Sears, Roebuck Catalogue. They liked it, I liked it and I think it represents their music pretty well.
You can catch them, and often me, tonight at MoDaddy’s and every Wednesday. They put on a kickin good show, and you owe it to yourself to catch these guys. And it’s free. See you there!
Michael Sanacore, Chris Riddle and I made these one-of-a-kind invitations to an after-party earlier this year. Something about the flexibility and the limitations of the typewriter was really inspiring. It made me think of the typewriter in a whole new way. It’s really a miniature printing press, that can only use one font, one style, one size, one color and one weight. But other than that — you can use almost any size paper, any orientation. It’s really marvelous, and lots of fun. They turned out very well I think. My favorite one:
“Don’t listen to her. Come to the after-party.”
You look ridiculous. Come get ridiculous.
I know everybody has a place to be on Halloween, but it always ends early too early, doesn’t it? Come anytime after midnight and we’ll keep it going til the late night. Last year’s party was so much fun I can’t help but try and and repeat the success. And you are all invited! And service workers: just because you couldn’t get Halloween off doesn’t mean you missed all the good parties — we’ll be waiting for you.
Some of the highlights:
- It’s not a basement. It’s a dance dungeon.
- DJ Par will be spinning again
- Look a fool in @itswendylou’s Photo Booth of Horrors
- Purple Jesus will save you.
- Drink up! (Donations accepted.)
Facebook much? RSVP why don’t you.
I made the flyer, and I made a map too.
Jon Corbin of the Firecracker Jazz Band asked me to design a new poster for the band. I love designing a poster and the Firecrackers are my favorite local band, so it was a really fun project. I was initially going to go art deco, but that’s a hard milieu to swim and make it look classy and not cheesy, so I abandoned it pretty quickly.
Typography has always been my strength in design, so instead of being frustrated, I resorted to what I knew. The only typeface used is Rockwell, which looks great pulled, pushed enlarged, suggested, shown, etc. I don’t think I’ve used Rockwell previously, but it is certainly in my palette now. Only six words are used and three images, including the piano aflame image by Jason Krekel that they use as a logo.
Problem solving + creativity = design.
I love doing it.
Here’s some of my inspiration. Smashing Magazine: Breathtaking Typographic Posters
Just wrapped up this poster on Thursday for jar-e, an Asheville musician. Par (who is co-celebrating a birthday with me) hooked me up with this job. I’ve really been working on improving my Illustrator chops, and it’s nice to be rewarded with a little bit of paying work. Hopefully this leads to more! Look for it around town. If you see it, take your picture standing next to it and send it to me, I’ll buy you your choice of coffee or beer.
