watermelon/coral, baby blue, butter yellow, and fuschia— what's better?

This year, we signed a new lease on the office. Last year was so crappy that Noreen and I decided a mini-overhaul was due. We had the office repainted and replaced the green carpet that looked like a dental office. We’ve lived with the same pastel colors for 17 years, and it seemed like the right time to evolve. For me that meant leaving behind the world of 1955 and moving forward to 1967. Mary Blair’s color palette for How To Succeed in Business Without Really Trying has always been a favorite of mine. So this became our jumping off point.

I was pleased that we were evolving into a more sophisticated palette until the building management reported back that they loved it because it looked like a Mexican restaurant. Fine by me, if we could get a liquor license I would gladly begin to serve Margaritas. I’m sure it would be more profitable than being a design firm. Hey, there’s an idea here. I’ll talk to Noreen about this tomorrow.

the view from my desk

a butterscotch wall and the grey carpet and Kris

avocado green and baby blue, welcome to our nightmare

baby blue and a poster shrine

a peek into the avocado green kitchen (it's too messy to show)

Noreen's own little corner

They say it's too bright.

How To Succeed in Business Without Really Trying, Mary Blair color

How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying, Mary Blair color

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The new sample boxes, neat and orderly

Design samples are like printed t-shirts. You end up with too many, they look messy, you can’t decide which ones to throw away, and you find surprises when you look through them. As you age, design samples become increasingly problematic. Should I keep that one-color envelope sample? Maybe someone will need it for a retrospective when I’m 80. Pentagram and AIGA have walk-in safes for their archives. We don’t.

Years ago, we decided to buy good archival boxes for the samples. The original concept was that they would all match and look well ordered. This idea, of course, went tragically off the rails. The boxes multiplied in every shape and size possible. The neat labels didn’t correspond to the contents. It looked pretty sloppy. So I decided it was time to start fresh.

At first, we planned on buying a new set of archival boxes that all matched. Do you have any idea how expensive 100 of those cost? Too much. And I don’t think we need the whole archival quality. The samples aren’t the original Declaration of Independence. We found a box made by Uline that is a deep “pizza” box. They were only $1.00 or so each. That works for my budget. Now all samples have been pared down. The one-color envelopes have been discarded. New labels arrange items alphabetically by client, so we can add items as needed. Now, I need to tackle the flat files. Why all those press sheets of jobs printed 15 years ago?

Before. Sloppy boxes

After

6 boxes per cubby

Labels

A sample box with dishes

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