Where were we?

So, last autumn in Pittsburgh, I applied for an opening with Big Burrito --a restaurant consortium (consortium? Is that what you call it? They own a number of different restaurants.) as a graphic designer. 

Unfortunately (or not--who knows? We can't see around the bends of the paths not taken.), they went with an applicant who had more relevant experience. I can't fault them for that. But the really liked my illustrative style, and they asked if they could hire me to design some new tshirts for their Mexican Fusion chain, Mad Mex. 

It was a challenging job -- I had a difficult time getting on the same wavelength as the art director. I kept having glimmers of great ideas that just never solidified. I made some sketches: 

...and while some of them were heading the right general direction (he liked the skull), in general, they just weren't quite clicking. So we talked about it, discussed design ideas, and finally came up with some stuff we thought would work. Dia de los Muertos Roller Derby girls:

And some hipster magicians: 

And then: 

They chose to use two of the images on tshirts and even sent me a couple: 

Then I learned to do roller derby, and here's me in my derby gear, and my derby girl tshirt: 

Rickert & Beagle Books

A good friend of mine back in Pittsburgh kind of...fell into being an awesome bookstore owner of an awesome bookstore. Even more awesome, she co-owns it with Peter S. Beagle, the author of the infamous Last Unicorn: 

And then, she thought *I* was cool enough to design the corporate identity for the new store name, Rickert & Beagle Books. 

So, here are some sketches: 

She loved the sketches and said I totally got her vibe -- she liked a) Victorian inspired stuff and b) vintage scifi stuff -- and that they were fantastic, and so the next step was to make some more complete versions digitally of her favorite designs: 

And then fiddling with the hand-drawn lettering:

Trying some embellishments and variations in typeweight:

And then, finally: 

look how official!

  

Down the line we are hoping for me to design some tshirts as well! Yay!