For the Love of Design

There's an old saying, "Choose a job you love, and you will never have to work a day in your life."

As Creative Director at Harvest Media, I have the privilege of doing a job I love. And since it's Valentine's Day, I'd like to share some of the things that I and our team love about what we do.

We love creating more with less.

Graphic design is not decoration. Neither is it art, though it's often artful. It is a uniquely visual form of communication.

Graphic design is about getting your message into someone else's head in a way that is clearly understood, powerful, and memorable.

Designers purposefully combine letters, colors, shapes, images, icons, and other elements until all the individual parts dissolve into one coherent whole. The end result is a simpler, more meaningful, and more effective message.

The process of creating simplicity from complexity, creating more with less, is one of the things we thrive on.

We love solving interesting problems.

Our team loves a good challenge, and every design project provides us with a new opportunity to rise to the occasion.

Every project is like a miniature mystery, a new problem to be solved. We get to discover clues, determine what's most important, and create the best solution possible.

The moment when we reach a solution that is clear, creative, novel, and relevant — that's a golden moment.

We love helping people succeed.

Few things compare to the joy of helping people. One of the greatest compliments our team ever received was when a client said to us in a meeting, "I can tell every time we talk that you want what's best for our business." We were truly humbled by that sentiment.

Here's to the adventure!

Of course, in agency life, not every day is pure design bliss. There are roller coaster moments, some that make you nervous (or down-right terrified) and others that have you laughing with your hands in the air. But the beauty of simplicity, the challenge of the design process, and the joy of helping people give us a tremendous sense of purpose and make us get off the roller coaster with a smile saying, "Let's do it again!"