Inspiration

Inspiration

New Look, Who Dis?

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MandaMacBrandingMock-Up

It’s been a very busy few years here at Manda Mac Designs. Over the last 2 years I’ve taken on other business opportunities and on August 24th, 2017 gave birth to my son, Logan. I’ve had my hands full with my now almost 2-year old, but I’ve been feeling inspired to finally redesign my long-neglected brand identity. When you spend so much time creating for others, it can be hard to find the time/energy to create for yourself (I’m finding similar feelings in motherhood as well!).

I have been the hardest client I have ever had to deal with…but after months of toying with hundreds of ideas, I finally felt I had captured my “look”. I wanted it to be the perfect blend of classic and modern with minimalist undertones. I wanted it to capture a level of sophistication that would comfort clients knowing they’ve come to the right designer. And dare I say it, I think I’m finally happy with it.

I used a classic black and white colour scheme and incorporated both vintage and modern fonts. To add visual interest I wanted to use texture such as black linen paper and marble on my website, and raised gloss on my business cards. I wanted a level of elegance applied to a very simple design concept. I’m very much a “less is more” kind of designer. I feel it has finally come together and I’m proud to launch my new brand.

Manda Mac Designs may have a new look, but I promise to continue to deliver the same quality of creative work and professional services my clients know to expect from me. On to the next project!

~ Manda Mac

MMD_LOGOsiteicon

Client Projects, Inspiration

Creating Rustic Wedding Stationary

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hollyweddingstationarymockup

Rustic Wedding Stationary

I had the pleasure of creating several pieces of stationary for the wedding of Holly and Tyler Graham that took place earlier this month. This bride knew exactly what she wanted, and lucky for me, she has great taste. It was a lot of fun working together and it always feels great to help a client’s vision come to life.

The design through out all of her stationary pieces was consistent: rustic and simple, letting the fun font choices be the main focal-point of the design. The pieces I created for Holly included the wedding invitation, program, menu and monogram.

I created a vector line-map of the ceremony and reception locations for the back of the Wedding Invitation, as well as a few vine graphics to use through out all of her pieces.

The pieces were printed on a rustic, cardboard stock and the wedding invitations had rounded corners. They printed beautifully and I was thrilled to see another happy client.

Thanks for choosing me to help bring your ideas to life, Holly!

For anyone interested in having a custom made invitation or other stationary piece, don’t hesitate to contact me.

Thanks for reading!

~ Manda Mac

 

Client Projects, Inspiration

Standing Out with Laura Leyser

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Real Estate Self-Promotion Handout
Real Estate Self-Promotion Handout

 

Standing Out

With Laura Leyser

I was asked to create a promotional piece for Laura Leyser, the past president of the Canadian Real Estate Association. In addition to being an active REALTOR®, Laura is also a professional speaker. She delivers a high energy presentation all over the world to share her first-hand experiences in the real estate industry. Her presentation, Step Up to Stand Out, centres on how to stand out from the crowd and find success in real estate.

Anyone who has met this woman knows that she is a force to be reckoned with. She is a powerful, dynamic leader who has worked her whole life to get to where she is now. Her presentations are filled with knowledge, experience and strength and she needed a brand identity that reflected that. During these presentations, speakers typically have a slideshow as well as handouts to give out. Laura noticed that a lot of her peers had the same kind of handouts; a simple 8.5 x 11″ paper with a lot of text about themselves and their presentation. To stay true to her presentation, we needed to create something different to help her stand out.

The resulting design for her handout was a smaller, more convenient postcard to give out to listeners. This was much easier to hold on to and keep through out the day than a larger, 8.5 x 11″ paper. We wanted the card to be in full colour and to look professional. The content was kept short and to the point. On the front we have a small “resume” of her impressive capabilities as well as her contact information. On the back, a short “about me” section with a list of her titles and achievements. Her presentation slideshow was also created using this same brand identity; a dark, dramatic charcoal-grey background with elements of gold, and we used strong, structured typography. She also had some wonderful professional photographs to work with which can make all the difference when putting together a promotional piece like this!

Working with a fearless, independent leader like Laura was not only a wonderful learning experience, but inspiring as well. It was an honour creating a brand to suit such a powerhouse.

Chicks Rule.

~ Manda Mac

Client Projects, Inspiration

Making Admail Fun

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Abbax – Mailer Admail
Abbax – Mailer Admail
Abbax – Mailer Admail

 

Making Admail Fun

About two months ago I was asked to create some admail postcards for Abbax. Abbax is one of the most progressive providers in North America for Cloud services, serving clients across the globe. While I was happy to take on the project, admail (also affectionately referred to as “junk mail”) can be challenging to create for several reasons.

  1. It’s referred to as JUNK mail…so the typical consumer response to receiving this type of mail is to immediately throw it in the trash. You need to try and design something that will catch their eye long enough to NOT throw away.
  2. You want your card size to be small for lower printing costs and convenient mailing purposes. But a small card size can create challenges for designing the layout when wanting to add a lot of information and graphics to a small amount of space.
  3. Defining your message can be difficult. Due to the above two reasons, you need to identify  a short and to-the-point marketing message for your business and/or services. If you don’t have a lot of space for designing your layout, and you don’t have a lot of time for your consumer to consider your piece then you need to identify your core message and marketing goal, and create a minimal amount of text to communicate that message. Humans are very visual (and sometimes lazy!) creatures, we would much rather look at a picture than read a paragraph.

So to get started I did some research to understand the type of company Abbax is, their brand identity and the type of designs they currently use for their marketing pieces. Their website was modern, colourful and fun which appropriately reflects the company and what they do.

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I wanted to make sure the mailer designs matched the “look” of their company and so I used some of the bold colours that I found on their website and used similar icons to help communicate the services being provided. The purpose of these mailers was to market 3 different Abbax service bundles. Three slightly different designs were created to highlight each of the service bundles: “Fax and E-mailing services”, “Unlimited Calling” and “Storage and Backup”. I wanted the designs to look consistent across all 3 cards so I used the same colour scheme in different ways, only changing the location of the colours and the icon designs for each card. Each mailer had the same design on the back of the card which listed all of the services provided.

While these projects can sometimes be on the boring side and tiresome to create…this project was a lot of fun to design and both the client and I were super happy with the result. Using fun icons and bold colours can really help make a design eye-catching, but I personally feel it also makes designing more enjoyable. Junk mail doesn’t have to be so boring!

If you or your business are in need for marketing mail pieces, e-mail me at manda.mac.design@gmail.com

Thanks for reading!
~ Manda Mac

Client Projects, Inspiration

Digital Love for Digital Portraits

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Digital Portrait – Adobe Illustrator & Tablet
Digital Portrait – Adobe Illustrator & Tablet

Digital Love
for Digital Portraits

As a graphic designer, I knew I should be putting my skills to work when creating gifts for my 4 beautiful bridesmaids…but what to do? I thought it would be fun to create caricatures of them, I mean, who doesn’t want a cartoon version of themselves?! I then stumbled upon an old tutorial on Design Instruct that taught me some really cool techniques for creating digital portraits, it made the portraits take on more of a tactile feel like it was painted with watercolour and marker. I used Adobe Illustrator and my tablet and pen, and started sketching. While they were time consuming projects (I may be a slight perfectionist) the end results were even better than I had hoped. It was really fun trying to “capture” my lovely ladies, making sure I got that sparkle in their eye or that certain curl of their lip. I’ve already received a few requests to make more of these portraits so I thought I’d post and let all ya’ll know that this will be a service I can offer my clients. Let’s get digital!

For any fellow designers or artists that are interested in learning how to create these digital portraits, take a look at Miguel Cardona’s tutorial on Design Instruct: Make Watercolor and Marker Style Portraits with Illustrator

Connect with me through my website, my facebook page or email me at manda.mac.design@gmail.com to inquire about getting a portrait done!