Elixir’s invitation for the National Fish & Wildlife Foundation (NFWF) is featured on page 144 of the September/October issue of Communication Arts. The magazine’s 52nd Design Annual features 174 winning projects from 4,291 entries.

Celebrating the Great Outdoors, the Foundation’s third annual Bay Area fundraising event, was held on March 28, 2011. The invitation and related collateral were inspired by event designer Stanlee Gatti’s vision for the event—a pop-up, tented forest on San Francisco’s Crissy Field. Elixir collaborated with UK illustrator Mary Woodin to create immersive scenes that emerge on dimensional corrugated cardboard panels produced by Oscar Printing.

Over the past 26 years, the National Fish & Wildlife Foundation has helped craft a remarkably broad variety of solutions to extraordinary environmental challenges. Both innovative and pragmatic in their approach, the organization serves as a catalyst for conservation action and effectiveness. Their myriad of conservation partnerships connect them with key federal and state agencies, top industry leaders, concerned private citizens, and non-profit leadership from the international to the local level. In 2010 alone they proudly awarded 417 grants, leveraging $60 million in federal and non-federal funds to a total on-the-ground investment of $179 Million. Of that total, $18.7 million was invested in California.

Photos from the event:

Elixir is excited to be working with the San Francisco Symphony to develop invitations and event materials for its Centennial Opening Night Gala on September 7, 2011. The dinner and concert — Fanfare for a New Century — inaugurate the Symphony’s centennial season. On this occasion, Maestro Michael Tilson Thomas and the Orchestra will be joined onstage by legendary soloists Itzhak Perlman and Lang Lang. Proceeds from the Centennial Gala directly benefit the Orchestra’s myriad education, community, and artistic programs, thanks to which more than 75,000 Bay Area children receive music education each year. The Gala is the grand overture to a week of symphonic festivities, including a free concert outdoors in San Francisco’s Civic Center Plaza on September 8.

prAna brought Elixir in to establish the brand’s visual language and, in tandem, to begin developing prAna’s first direct-to-consumer catalog. The company had built a loyal following among climbers and yoga practitioners who valued the brand’s authenticity. Without compromising the soulfulness that defined its first 17 years in business, prAna wanted to attract a broader audience of outdoor enthusiasts, artists, and other “cultural creatives” to drive significant growth. The management team described prAna’s desired revitalized brand position as balancing “the thrilling tension between mindful living and living on the edge.”

prAna’s primary sales channel was through retail partners in over 40 countries (from REI and Amazon to independent yoga studios and climbing gyms). The company wanted to increase direct sales, via a catalog to complement its website and new retail outlets, including prAna’s store-within-a-store in Santa Barbara—for which Elixir designed various aspects of the in-store experience.

The Fall and Holiday 2010 catalog mailings include many prospective customers unfamiliar with the brand. To infuse the books with the spirit of prAna without sacrificing selling space, Elixir paired product and lifestyle shots with hand-crafted touches. These include hand-drawn shadows behind merchandise; hand-lettered titles and text; and the juxtaposition of illustrations by Jeremy Collins with images from a host of specialized photographers: Andrew Burr, Mario Covic, Jeffrey Cunningham, Tim Kemple, Amir Magal, Ben Moon, Richard Seagraves, Boone Speed, Rich Van Every, and Jeremiah Watt. If you aren’t on the mailing list and would like to receive the Holiday issue, you can sign up here.

prAna’s new Santa Barbara store celebrated its grand opening on October 25, 2010. Here are a few photos of the preparations—and illustrations—that set the scene.

Illustrator Jeremy Collins making his mark in the store.

Signage (designed by Elixir) paired with the company’s new expansive “tagline”—which also lives on the cover of the catalog.

The floor-to-ceiling chalkboard is great for announcing events and engaging the community.

Elixir has recently been engaged by San Francisco architects Aidlin Darling Design. The multidisciplinary firm, founded in 1997 by partners Joshua Aidlin and David Darling, has completed public, commercial and residential projects in addition to furniture and interior design commissions.

Aidlin Darling Design has been honored by the Smithsonian’s Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum in 2010 as a Finalist in the Interior Design category of the National Design Awards. The Awards Gala will be held on October 14, 2010, in New York City, in conjunction with National Design Week.

Greenwood School, a Waldorf-inspired pre-kindergarten through 8th grade based in Mill Valley, CA, worked with Elixir to develop a marketing strategy, brochure and admissions kit.

The Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf — A set of tins was part of a comprehensive brand visual language that Elixir developed for the coffee retailer’s ’09 holiday promotion.

The National Fish & Wildlife Foundation 2009 Fundraiser — Elixir designed the invitation and collateral for the event honoring Julie Packard, Executive Director of the Monterey Bay Aquarium.

Elixir has been retained by the owners of Hotel Healdsburg and h2hotel in Healdsburg (67 miles north of San Francisco), to redesign the packaging of their spa products. Recently reformulated with natural and organic botanical ingredients, the line will include: Meyer Lemon & Sage Shampoo and Bath Gel; Lavender, Jasmine & Blood Orange Conditioner; Lavender, Rosemary & Orange Blossom Lotion; and Lavender, Rosemary & Sweet Orange Soaking Salts. Both hotels will feature the spa products in their guest rooms.

Since 2001, the Hotel Healdsburg has been Sonoma County’s premier luxury wine country lodging. Its sister, h2hotel, opens today. The new LEED Certified, eco-friendly property includes solar heat, a living roof, innovative heating and air systems, and an underground cistern for water collection. Construction used a combination of sustainable and local materials.

For reservations or more information:

Hotel Healdsburg
25 Matheson Street
Healdsburg, CA 95448
T 707.431.2800

h2hotel
219 Healdsburg Avenue
Healdsburg, CA 95448
T 707 922-5251

The Spa Hotel Healdsburg
327 Healdsburg Avenue
Healdsburg, CA 95448
T 707.433.4747

Jennifer Jerde, Elixir’s Founder and Creative Director, was honored to be one of seven judges of Exhibitor Magazine’s 24th Annual Exhibit Design Awards. Winners were announced in the May issue of the magazine and recently published online.

Samsung Electronics won the top honor for the optical illusion they created via mirror-covered ceiling & walls paired with light projections through the exhibit’s glass floor. The design showcased Samsung’s new generation of LED TVs (144 were present on eight floor-to-ceiling columns). Other winners—from an impressive array of international entries—included Teknion, Automobili Lamborghini, Eternit, Autodesk, Audi, SpinVox, Saudi Telecom, Daimler, Herman Miller, Sony, Yokohama, O.C. Tanner and Ewo.

Elixir is excited that our packaging for Golden Star Tea Company is included in Box Bottle Bag. The new book from The Dieline and HOW Books features “the best of the best” in packaging design.

About the book, author and The Dieline Editor Andrew Gibbs says “Great packaging adds more than just monetary value to a product—it adds emotional value. It has the power to directly trigger the emotions of the consumer, and is what makes someone fall in love with a product, or even hate it. It’s that emotional connection that makes a design a success.”

When asked about working with Elixir, Golden Star Tea Company’s CEO Eddie Carden added:

“We came to Elixir with a packaging design challenge, and we communicated it to them as a story. Elixir is intuitive, expert at listening, and what they came back with was remarkable. They converted our story into a design, translated that into a prototype, and now the story we hear back from people looking at our package design is the same one we told Elixir at the beginning. We wanted the packaging to make a promise regarding the quality of the product inside the bottle. Elixir’s design successfully communicates to our customers the type of experience they might expect, and it sets their expectations high, exactly where we want them.”

To read more about the book and its author or purchase a copy, click here.

Elixir’s packaging for Golden Star Tea Company will also be featured this fall in the Graphis Design Annual 2010.

Naturopathica—founded in 1995 and based in East Hampton, New York—reached out to Elixir to rebrand itself with a relaunch of its skin and beauty products. At that time, the line was carried by select high profile spas around the country and sold direct online. Naturopathica enjoyed a small loyal following but was frustrated by a fiercely competitive marketplace brimming with false claims. Barbara Close, Founder and CEO, knew the brand was flying under the radar and suspected that the packaging’s home-grown look and misperceptions about the performance of botanical skin care were factors that needed to be addressed.

As part of our North Star process, Elixir conducted 1-on-1 interviews with current & prospective customers and spa partners to help Naturopathica understand how their brand was perceived. The findings illuminated the gap between current perceptions and desired positioning, inspiring the company to undertake a comprehensive retooling of everything from product to packaging. The company reformulated many of it’s products—replete with sustainable, certified-organic and wildcrafted ingredients—to earn ECOCERT certification, while Elixir developed the elevator pitch and redesign of Naturopathica’s brand visual language—including identity, business system, style guide and packaging for nearly 100 products.

Barbara Close sums up her Elixir experience to date:

“We have worked with various design and branding firms over the years. When I reviewed Elixir’s portfolio, I felt there was great attention to detail and adherence to simplicity, both very important for Naturopathica.

Elixir put us front and center. Everyone on the team was an excellent listener, so we felt really ‘met.’ They understood our lineage of apothecary and the challenge of honoring our roots and telling our story in an interesting visual way. Elixir’s North Star process helped us unearth our gems and bring them out into our materials. They were great at helping us get to an unexpected place, what I call ‘the aha factor.’ The whole process has been very exciting.”

Elixir designed three custom bottle shapes with emboss of Naturopathica’s logotype. A custom color was applied to the remaining off-the-shelf containers providing consistency across 48 retail skus.

All collateral and packaging is made from 100% recycled fibers with a minimum of 35% post-consumer material.

Look for it online at at www.naturopathica.com and at the finest holistic spas (in San Francisco at Therapeia and Studio C Skincare; in Sausalito at Cavallo Point; in Berkeley at Claremont Resort & Spa).

Details post-comping for an early presentation of look & feel referencing the vintage typography and palette of ‘apothecary.’

Botanical images were sourced specifically by species and region from the University and Jepson Herbaria at the University of California, Berkeley.

Taylor’s Automatic Refresher—the Bay Area’s classic and well-loved hamburger & fries eatery—reopens this week as Gott’s Roadside. Elixir was retained to rename and then develop the new identity. Collateral included a website, menus, signage, apparel and packaging.

You’re invited to help Gott’s celebrate this Thursday, March 25 from 6-9 p.m. at San Francisco’s Ferry Building and again on Friday, March 26 from 6-8 p.m. at their St. Helena and Napa locations. Free cheeseburgers, ahi burgers, Seoul burgers and fries will be served, and Elixir-designed t-shirts will be given away. Visit http://gottsroadside.com/ for directions. We hope to see you there!

Joel and Duncan Gott opened their original St. Helena location in 1999.

A second location opened in 2004 in San Francisco’s gourmet mecca, the Ferry Building Marketplace.

Gott’s opened at Napa’s Oxbow Public Market in 2008.