anoki.net

As I said a few days ago, I’ve been busy this summer! Here are some freshly launched site designs that I have been working with some great clients on…

Just launched: The revamping of Maia Duerr’s Liberated Life Project! It was a pleasure to work with Ms. Duerr once again (I created with her the Five Directions logo) as we poised creative exuberance with calm readability in the reworking of the look and content of her inspirational blogging opus. Adding a splash of color, and some interesting page layouts, this 2.0 view of Maia’s perspective on liberation and life  has a new hierarchy, structure, and vivacity throughout the site that finally I think it is starting to be able to hold the power of Maia’s amazing writing.

www.liberatedlifeproject.com

Also, just launched: I also have had the esteemed honor to work with Councilperson-runner Brian Rudnick, Green/Independent, of the 8th District of Philadelphia as he campaigns for office this coming November 11th. Quickly setting up a branding scheme and a content management site with news updates, volunteer signups, and tools to get volunteers involved and informed, the site is already being used by Rudnick and his staff to spread the news of his campaign run. Wishing all the best of luck to Mr. Rudnick, and very happy to help!

www.brianrudnick.com

Coming up:

• A site design and content management setup for the Presence Care Project
• A site design and content management setup for a Philadelphia architecture firm
• A site design for a new Wilmington, Delaware computer repair service

As the summer has been rolling on, I’ve been busy keeping my head low and keeping my hands busy with projects. As of late I’ve had the honor to be working with the branding and materials for Bryn Mawr Rehab’s 16th Annual ArtAbility Exhibition, the creation of the Presence Care Project’s new logo, the designing and creation of Emily’s Working Home, as well as the growth of the Delaware Association of the Blind’s site! As I said: I have been BUSY!

For the last 4 years I have helped Bryn Mawr Rehab recreate their annual ArtAbility Exhibition look and materials: from Save the Dates to invites, to signage, advertisements, posters and programs books. I’ve had the honor to help the folks at BMRH promote the opening event and ongoing tour of the amazing artwork done globally by those with disabilities, and this summer we are doing it again.

It’s truly breathtaking stuff these artists make beyond their disabilities, and I’m happy to say that I feel the materials this year meet the standard necessary to frame the work of such inspiring artists. Thank you to Heather Zoumas-Lubeski! Have fun!

Marguerite Manteau-Rao, an prolific and well-followed blogger works with all sorts of people in different stages of dementia, hospice, and pain and helps them through meditation, mindfulness practices, and presence techniques. I was very happy to have her approach me to begin branding and, not only promoting the work that she is doing, but also create a point in which practitioners can gather information about her techniques and findings. So far, the logo for The Presence Care Project is coming along nicely!

I’ve also had the pleasure to help the new Executive Director of the Delaware Association for the Blind to up the ante on their site by adding more information, ways of connectivity, and about outreach and support. There was so much new content we  had to even split up the navigation into two sections! Sometimes more is better, and the Board at DAB are filling the site to the brim! Originally coded to give the highest possibly accessibility to all visitors, the new changes retain such visual and audio assistive innovations as style sheet manipulation, renditions for color variety and magnification, as well as an audio screen reader-ready format and certification from online accessibility checkers such as the Section 508 Accessibility Compliance Standards, WCAG Priority 1 Standards from the Web Accessibility Initiative of W3C and others. – www.dabdel.org

Emily Breder is another amazing writer and online mover-and-shaker who needed her quickly-gaining-momentum blog, Emily’s Working Home, to go through a refit as she is taking off writing about her unique experiences, in-field findings, and work/life-hacks in the ever-evolving paradigm between work and home. Taking personal elements in for materials to design from, we utilized a portion of Emily’s Zen name that has a root in the concept of Home as a logotype and used brushstroked clouds and careful color choices throughout the site to give Emily her online “home”. Stay tuned to this one! –  www.emilybreder.com

I’ve totally and fully given in to the Google Plus craze and can say that I am happily creating new circles and new connections! If you look around the site, you’ll see I’ve added Google Plus links everywhere.

It’s a very interesting network, that spawns so much conversation it’s a little hard to keep up. But the variety of extensions for Chrome and tools built in make sorting things out do-able. Actually, the sorting out of who get’s what posts and refining these circles of lists is actually really interesting! I use Facebook (who doesn’t) but only in a professional direction. When I’m there, it’s like MySpace: so many new things, so overloaded, it’s like I don’t recognize it any more. Good thing the tools I use with my clients are pretty standard.

Some things I love about G+

• I love it’s not a social “have-to” like Facebook; when that fails, circles to the rescue
• I love that it interfaces so well with my other Google things, like Gmail, Picasa, etc.
• I love the look and feel and excitement of the growing community
• The connectivity options are amazing and privacy is simple, not harsh
• I can see how this is going to add to my skill set, knowledge base, and colleague connects already

Some things I think they still need to get together with the new G+:

• They need to gracefully add Buzz, as I use it daily to share with select friends
• They need to make that +1 button post to your stream, like Facebooks Like and the others
• They need to work out that Hangout / Google Voice Plug-in issue
• A few layout and visual mods (some are handled with extensions)
• I can’t wait for Posterous and Twitter integration

Feel free to look me up, there aren’t too many Anoki’s on there (there’s actually only two more); I have circles for web heads, freelancers, colleagues, and clients!

gplus.to/anokinet