Giving ideas form for their function.
On our recent tour of the western states, we drove through California’s Mojave desert. The colors of the sun, sky, and desert wove a spell in our imagination leaving us just a tad breathless.
We tend to hide ourselves from nature when it is nature that give the inspiration, the rejuvenation our souls need. Today, we’re inspired by the colors and tones, shapes and textures of nature.
What inspires you today?
Image from http://gradschoolragecomics.tumblr.com/image/40343278818
This year has been one of change, but aren’t they all?
It was a year of seeing the capacity for growth – and the fleetingness of life.
And yet despite the challenges there is still hope.
Let there be amazing joy, peace, and love in the world and in your life.
And may we all enjoy a new year filled with hope.
Our year can be summed up with one word… Grateful.
This year has been one of change. About getting back to the roots and reasons for doing what we love. And we’re grateful.
We’re grateful for all of our friends and clients, for the work we created with you, and for the mercurial possibilities of life.
Best wishes for a safe, happy, and healthy holiday season and new year.
And may we all enjoy a new year filled with gratefulness and possibilities.
Everyone has a favorite season of the year. Mine is autumn, hands down.
The brisk morning air, falling leaves, clear nights, and the 
blue sky. The blue is deeper, richer, and makes the sky seem bigger and closer than in any other season. And somehow in contrast, every other color seems to pop and glow. The blue this time of year is so deep, it’s more feeling than simply a color.
I walk this time of year to bring a smile to my face and a bit of the sublime to my soul.
Turns out this specific Indian Summer blue really is special. Check out the explanation and science behind why we see this particular blue sky this time of year here.
Growing up in Michigan I fell in love with the autumn sky. A couple of years ago I was tickled blue to discover this rare color exists in another season – in late January and February.
This winter, take a peek at the sky when you encounter a beautiful clear day… you’ll see this intense deep blue sky again. As Indian Summer is an echo of warmer days, these winter blue skies are a promise of warmer days just round the bend.
Finding inspiration in odd moments, at odd times… it’s how to bring creativity and feeling to all we do.
Working this summer to create our new name, we focused on what we do… the cause and effect of design. These explorations quickly led us down the rabbit hole to color, light, and the theory that underpins all we do today in visual mediums.
And memories of playing with the Newton’s Cradle game in my dad’s office launched an exploration into Sir Isaac Newton.
Newton is well known for this three laws of motion. But in 1666 Newton also became the first to explain that light, white light, is made up of a spectrum of colors – ROYGBIV.
Turns out Newton is the father of the color wheel. He created a color circle to summarize the additive mixing of colors – Red, Green, Blue are thought of as additive primary colors – and the complements are placed across from them on the circle. This causes the colors to fall in order of their wavelengths. He went further to create color predictions based on lines between two colors.
Without Newton, color, light, and our understanding of both would have a very different view. I really like the one we have today… thanks Newton for your genius and your inspiration!
As a kid, I loved coloring, drawing, painting, and generally make things prettier. After a weekend visit to the DeYoung Museum in Golden Gate Park and seeing large scale paintings and murals, my Mom found me drawing on my bedroom wall. “We don’t draw on walls,” she said in her best Mom-voice. I replied “Yes we do… they did at the museum.” Wonderful kid-logic!
But even while scrubbing my masterpiece off of the wall I knew I had to make the world a more visually pleasant place.
Fast forward to college. After intensive business marketing and accounting classes I listened to the inner call to make things beautiful as well as useful and spent the rest of my college career honing my fine art talent and finished with a degree in graphic design.
Each step of my career has improved my design esthetic. Adding layers of understanding like reasons for consistency versus change, the ins and outs of offset and web printing – estimating, project management, mailing – and following modern design trends in communication.
Being an artist helping others see beauty in the world is still my main joy. Now the form is focused on creating clean designs that grabs your audience, improves your marketing efforts, and gets to your point.
I’d love to help you reach your target and have them see and understand clearly what you want to say.
Sonja Turner-Montaño Design is now Design&Effect.
Why the name change? you may ask. Great question.
On many levels, our original name, while descriptive of who we are, didn’t describe what we do. So, we headed back to the drawing board and came up with descriptions of the services we provide, areas of specialty, and what we like to do. We threw darts at the names, bounced them off friends and associates, and the best liked, most descriptive won!
We’re now Design&Effect.
Just like cause and effect. Only better looking.