Olive & Cocoa

xoxo

I've been doing illustrations for the Olive & Cocoa catalog over the past six months. If you're not familiar with them, you should be! They are a catalog company based in Utah and they have great luxury gift crates, fun things for the home, baby gifts, and the most gorgeous flower arrangements. For the illustrations I draw these two "girls" - Olive is the redhead and Cocoa's hair is black - and they are usually doing something kind of madcap and wearing something fabulous - cute shoes at the very least. I draw the illustrations on a Wacom tablet using photoshop. Here are some of my covers that came out over the holidays:


Oh Joy


O Tannenbaum - my first cover!


Christmas Story

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Oprah's favorite!

Yolka made it on the O list. Congratulations Marian! Yolka Chocolates was one of the most intensive projects I worked on this year, so I feel proud too.


See what I mean about orangey-red being the "it" color of the season.


Gourmet food page of Oprah's favorite things. It would be cool if she said," Oooh, these are pretty," and then unwrapped one and ate it. Let's pretend she has to sample everything personally.


Bonus spread on the table of contents. "From Russia with Love", that was their clever tag line.


photo: Skylar Nielsen
See the whole design process for creating Yolka Chocolates in my post below.

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Yolka Launch Party

photo: Skylar Nielsen



With Marian Rivkind at the Yolka launch party in SLC. Marian has worked so hard - she was born to be a successful entrepreneur.


Thanks to Marian for the flattering toast and tiptop event!


photo: Skylar Nielsen

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Design process: a box of chocolates

Yolka Chocolates


photos: Skylar Nielsen


Marian Rivkind shared with me her brilliant idea to create chocolate ornaments inspired by her Russian heritage. She was determined and passionate about making her product a reality, but needed creative input, branding, and concept design. We had a series of meetings and established that Marian is a modern gal, and so we wanted the product to reflect her design preferences. The chocolates had to be sleek and fresh-looking to the market but still carry the vestigial qualities of old world holiday traditions. She had already chosen the name Yolka, which is Russian for "holiday tree", and without question we knew it was the perfect name for the product.

The process went like this:

I took inspiration from the magical turrets we always associate with Russia.



Also, the exotic Ballet Russes:





And I always take inspiration from folk art - whenever I am trying to capture the authentic feel of a decorative tradition:





Exploring the font for the logo:

The logo after refinement:


Early sketches to envision the foil pattern for the chocolate ornaments:






The final drawings I did for the foil patterns:





Final leaf pattern for the chocolate foil, after separating it in photoshop and mocking up the black and metallic:



And the flower foil:



Brainstorming sketches to envision the box concept:



A more developed box concept sketch. Here you see how I used the Russian turret-shape:






An early mock up with the logo.


We decided early on to do an orangey-red for the box exterior. I was fresh from a conference with the International Association of Color Consultants, where we thought a lot about color marketing. I felt that an orangey-red would convey the social/sharing, celebratory aspect of the holiday season. We used black, gold, and silver to make it exotic, rich looking, and exclusive. It took some trouble-shooting to get the right hue. I ended up glazing the pre-production box with paint to get the right color. By the way, orangey-red is turning out to be the it color of the season.



Final product, finally!!! Actually, this process only took about three months time.



Yolka chocolates.

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Whimsical bunk beds

These imaginative bunk beds were created to express a specific place and memory for the client's grandchildren. The cabinet door closes to create a secret surprise.


For the top bunk, I painted the whimsical Grandma's Attic sign.


For the middle bunk, the family's cabin was the theme.


In the bottom bunk, we used the logo from the family's yacht to create a nautical theme.


Each level is full of family photos and wonderful details.


Interior Design: Denton House Interiors

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Talisker Map Mural

Before. Wood plank wall at the Talisker real estate gallery, where Denton House Design commissioned us to paint a vernacular-style mural of the Canyons resort and properties.


Even to get as far as this sketch was so much work because we were creating the map from scratch. Trent Call did all the brain gymnastics, piecing everything together. I could not have done this without Trent - my brain does not think in 3-D maps.


My approved sketch on an 11" by 17" piece of paper. The wall space we were covering was 5' by 15' long.




After. Completed mural painted in acrylic on barnwood, distressed and antiqued, coated with Golden UVLS matte varnish to protect it from light fading.



It really made the space come alive - they said it went beyond their expectations, and people love to place themselves on a quirky map.

Celadon green plaster

This is shimmer stone "plaster" that I custom mixed to pale celadon green. It was applied over a deeper shade of the same hue, base-coat. There are a least four thinly troweled layers.


Just this much color and added texture makes all the difference to enhance the arched niche and set-off the cabinetry in this dining area.


Interior Design: Denton House Interiors

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