Thursday, September 6, 2007

Honk, Honk...

Today, over 550 TGI Friday's stores will be opening boxes of their new menu and getting them ready for the start of business. Now I know what you are thinking, "Uh, and why are you excited about this - Friday's has not started serving gumbo or something?"

No TGI Friday's is not serving gumbo (heaven help them if they did), today the menu they use is mine. Designed from the cover to the back page, twelve pages in all, my creation. Almost a year in the making, my menu won out over 50 other menus, including those from some top New York and LA design firms. Now while the original concept was for the menu to look like a record album in shape and size, some things did need tweaking to make it restaurant ready. This is a huge step for me as a designer and for the small ad agency I work for. What can I say, I have to toot my own horn!

I took a stroll down memory lane and pulled out my photos from college. Had anyone told me over 10 years ago, "hey d, like in ten years or so, your going to do this huge project for some place called Friday's." I think I might have laughed and told them they were sniffing too much developer or spray mount and to possibly get a life.

More so it got me thinking have I changed as a designer/person or am I still the same "d" from ten years ago. And while Christopher likes to remind me, the world is ever changing therefore we on some level must change with it. I couldn't help but think how I have changed, but even though I've changed slightly, there are still some things drawn and tied to my core:

I still wear my sunglasses on top my head (otherwise I would lose them).
I'm still the quite one that sits waiting observing and taking in everything.
I still love cracking the music up while I work.
I still love my other fine arts that makes me a good designer; photography, painting and drawing.
I still love to draw the same thing over and over again (except in school it was vases - now it's pears).
I'm still the person people run to when they need to let off steam.
I still love getting a great idea in the car and scrambling for a scrape of paper to jot it down on (however this was easier in school, I always had my back pack).

So today or any time you're in a Friday's; you can look at the menu and say, "Hey, I know the person who did this!"

2 comments:

Devine Photography said...

Congratulations!! I have already told my husband that we will be having dinner at Fridays sometime this weekend so I can tell the waiter that I know you :)

Lauren said...

Well, that is just too darn cool! Way to go! And I can say I knew you when... :)