ASTER* - a design studio with a story

ASTER* is a design studio that works from a principle of mutually informed graphic design. We've concluded that designing from a basic and mutually well-understood premise can help us design better, operationalize your project sooner and help your business grow. We feel that without comprehensive information about the project and a personal knowledge about our clients and their goals, we will only design to our own criteria. Capturing your vision is the point.

Commitment to understanding the client's perspective enables us to construct a design environment that connects clearly and effectively to the targeted markets. Beyond establishing the palette and branding standards, we continue on the journey with our clients by evaluating the brand implementation, assessing the effects of our presentation.

Because we typically rebuild the company's presence from the ground up, we have an intuitive knowledge that can deliver the unconventional ideas and concepts that make the intended impact while staying focused on the smaller steps needed to make it happen. We believe that there are many ways to grow your business within a limited budget.

We'd like to share a few stories with you about our client relationships. Each was an existing small or medium sized retail businesses when we met. They all felt the push of growing into mature businesses and wanted a new look based on that evolution as well as an opportunity to re-introduce themselves to long-time customers. We got to know one another, established the guidelines of our mutually informed graphic design ideas and business flourished. We've also made some great friends along the way and we would like to introduce a few of them.

Thanks for coming by.

Talking beans

My story with KLATCH roasting began just over a year ago. My first impression of the KLATCH family was of a hardworking and ambitious group that while they didn't agree on everything could see that they had a huge marketable momentum after winning major awards for their coffee and barista training. On our first meeting, I told them I was a tea drinker, but, they assured me with a beguiling confidence, that would change. I think it was this project, journeying with a new client and exploring a quality product, that ultimately won me over.

KLATCH not only roasted and sold beans, but also maintained two retail locations and a barista training business as well. Our branding process started with some meetings to identify key distribution channels and competitors in each of these channels. At first, we aimed to create one logo for everything, but as we moved through the mood boards and palette creation, we decided to keep the communication clear for each channel – ultimately creating three logos based upon the same typeface.

What I appreciated most about KLATCH was their willingness to learn about what I do, and how I do it. We constantly challenged each other to clarify our opinions and decisions, resulting in a satisfying synthesis of what was best for their brand and their business presence.

KLATCH LOGOS (from top to bottom): 1) Roasting with the green bean turning into a roasted bean with a branch and leaf in the middle. 2) Retail with it’s whimsical party quotes and 3) training with a cup of espresso/coffee being poured in the middle.

Central to the KLATCH brand is the idea of conversation and we found the quotes to be the perfect indicator for the implied intimacy of conversations. They could be playful or serious, depending on the different publics composing each sales channel.

With the palette and messaging in place, we created a new presence for each of KLATCH's customers and designed or brand managed every piece that was manufactured to maintain high standards and ensure everything was properly executed.

In addition to offering coffee at each of their shops, KLATCH was also looking to expand retail distribution to boutique grocery stores. By placing the tag "Where coffee is the conversation" at the forefront of the communication, KLATCH hoped to establish the first sale and be easily recognized for subsequent purchase.

During the project, I got hooked on great coffee. I wanted to see if we could start a separate website experience that would match the enthusiasm of the KLATCH coffee of the month club. The project is a partnership with ASTER* and KLATCH to create an experience online (with a premium look and feel, easy shopping and gifting and a one page checkout) and offline with premiums and packaging that represents the beans they contain.

We've enjoyed and continue to value our friends at KLATCH and know the future has better ideas, more customers and rocketing sales. Man, this is some good coffee.

- Matthew Palmer

CREDITS: Palette and brand strategy, logo standards, All graphic design and layouts and headline/tag line copy writing by Matthew Palmer of ASTER*.

20 years of art and style

Twenty years ago, Mill Creek owner and president Stephen Herrero was carving wood logs making knot-noggins and selling them in and around the San Bernardino mountains. Today the company is a medium-size business, creating award winning wildlife art and sculpture. We first met with Mill Creek three years ago and have collaborated with them on branding and messaging new product development including sculptures made out of recycled wood and a line of premium bronze statues. The occasion of their 20th anniversary prompted a desire for a new catalog, website design and new seal/logos for each of the sculptures.

The product catalog was the key piece for Mill Creek to showcase what they were all about. Many of their dealers and wholesalers are mom and pop shops that like to get sales presentations in the mail. We came up with the idea of illustrating the catalog with thoughts, sketches and entries as if it were a researcher's field notebook of the 19th century.

Creating the book, some unique pieces needed to be made (20th anniversary compass, ruler, National Park stamps from jpeg to EPS) that took the budget over what it was intended to be, but the sacrifice was made to create a piece that was worthy of this occasion.

Customarily sold in national park gift shops, Mill Creek made the unorthodox decision to sell their collection online in an effort to sell limited edition and closeout items faster. It also gave them a more flexible way to release existing sculptures in various patinas. A secondary development of the website was the ability to present an in-depth personalization of the artisans who make up the studios of the Mill Creek production group.

Along my journey with Mill Creek, I have come to understand how a company can move through 20 years of expansion and contraction and still retain the freshness of creativity and wonder in the natural world that has characterized their work from the beginning.

- Matthew Palmer

CREDITS: Catalog - Layout and design by Matthew Palmer, ASTER* Maquette sketches by various Mill Creek artists and Matthew Palmer, ASTER* All product photography by Mill Creek.
Website - layouts and design ASTER* Programming by Creative Crate and Setwise Technology.

Fair Trade premium products

I first met Chad Cleveringa, president of 7loaves, at a conference in Minneapolis in 2001. He contacted me before the event and explained that he was starting a bookstore that sold Christian books and needed a brand to go with the name 7loaves, a reference to the miracle of Christ feeding hundreds of people with seven loaves of bread. Recently Chad decided he wanted to expand his organization to help third world artisans market their goods in the United States. 7loaves online was born.

The new direction of the business seemed to enhance the meaning of the seed breaking open, creating a 7 and an L. The brand was updated by a quick change of color palette and a website created.

In the beginning, 7loaves relied heavily on wholesale chains to move their product. They created an alliance with Whole Foods Market to offer shoppers premium fair trade goods. ASTER* provided point-of-purchase displays for the retail floor and materials to accompany the product, all with a clean, simple, environmental look. The Whole Foods Market relationship gave 7loaves high exposure to the target audience, but it also became evident that their unique products suffered in the low discerning dynamic of mass marketing . It was with this realization that they decided to go exclusively online.

The relationship with 7loaves brings opportunities with producers from around the world. Pictured here is kipepeo, Swahili for butterfly. Located in the Kibera slums of Nairobi, the women of kipepeo make these cards with an ingenious waste paper re-pulping process and found materials. When they needed a logo and stationary design, kipepeo approached Chad to see if he knew anyone who could assist them. He recommended me and I accepted the assignment pro bono. I was happy to present cards from this producer as my Christmas cards in 2009.
ASTER* continues to move and negotiate the varying markets of 7loaves. The website focus is a familiar one, but in a very saturated space. The next few months will be interesting as we move on with 7loaves as we take a hard look at their website and build the brand.

The relationship with 7loaves also brings opportunities with producers from around the world. The one pictured here is kipepeo (Swahili for butterfly). Located in the Kibera slums of Nairobi, the women of kipepeo make these cards from nothing but pulp. Needing a logo and stationary design, kipepeo approached Chad to see if he had anyone who could help on the project. He recommended me, and I accepted the project as pro-bono.

I am happy to present cards from this producer for my Christmas cards this year to help the women recover from the Nairobi riots which displaced some of the women, and destroyed the kipepeo warehouse almost 2 years ago.

- Matthew Palmer

CREDITS: All layouts and design by Matthew Palmer, ASTER*
Cards by kipepeo Philligona Atieno, you may purchase them at 7loaves.com

MULTIPLYING (from top to bottom): 1) Email newsletter template to highlight new product 2) Cards made by kipepeo, tags created by ASTER* partnered with 7loaves.

Tell us about it. We’d love hear what our part might be.



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