Carrotfishcots.

Chefs, open your baskets: Carrots, grouper, apricots, and olives?

At least there was no sea cucumber. Or licorice.

This whimsical artwork is fourth in a series of collage illustrations for our favorite fine dining establishment, Biga on the Banks, for their current ad in Texas Monthly. From just one key word, we get the challenge of creating a fresh image each month, to promote Biga's ever-changing, chef-inspired daily menu.

BTW, everyone send positive vibes to Bruce Auden, who is nominated for Best Chef, Southwest, by the prestigious James Beard Society. Presentations in May, good luck Bruce!

Design sherpas.

The Khumbu Climbing Center project — to design a web site documenting a studio project for the School of Architecture at Montana State University, Bozeman — came through an old friend who now heads advanced architecture studios at MSU. Michael Everts has led successive teams of students through this stunner of a project, sited in the Kingdom at the Roof of the World - Nepal. Engaged by the international alpinist community, who had lost one of their own on Everest, the School has designed a community center and climbing school for a small village named Phortse, a base camp site along the ascent. Issues of cultural appropriateness, sustainable building practices, and innovative energy systems all came into play, informing an aesthetic expression unique to time and place.

Website is scheduled to be completed by MSU SoA students in summer 2012.

Humor in Marketing

Sometimes a little levity is the perfect pitch. For this save-the-date card for the Chisholm Trail Heritage Museum, I mined the client's collection of vintage postcards for an opportunity. My client is a great party host, with a background in hospitality, and knows that a touch of wit helps keep the mood light and interest sparked. Working with material related to cowboys, we are careful to resist corn-pone humor. But here, we poke sly fun at our modern Texian lifestyle, through a little talking-horse Mr. Ed humor.

Alamo Architects Update

Starting a brand refresh for Alamo Architects, working with the notion of collaging elements of urban context. We're using vintage neon signs for a playful anchor to this new look. Who doesn't love old, weathered neon can letters? Fortunately for this effort, the letters in *Alamo* appear a lot — in "motel" and "eat" signs. More to come.

Tech tool: QR Codes

 Quick Response codes are cropping up everywhere. This particularly nice looking one links to the Pecha Kucha event happening this Saturday in support of survivors of the recent earthquake and tsunami disasters in Japan. http://global-day.pecha-kucha.org/

Astrid Klein and Mark Dytham, the architects who started the Pecha Kucha night, are based in Japan, and have initiated a world wide event to spark giving. Japanese for "chit chat," or the sound of conversation, Pecha Kucha has come to mean a creative gathering where participants zip through twenty slides at twenty seconds each, a high-energy group share of latest interests and projects. Read about Klein-Dytham at http://www.klein-dytham.com/ and more about the Pecha Kucha movement at http://www.klein-dytham.com/pechakucha/what