Today Apt Design is launching its newest venture - www.myPassionProject.com !
my Passion Project is a community-written blog that allows visitors to share with the world what they love to do - quickly, easily and for free!
A Passion Project is what you spend your extra time, money and effort on. Something you love to do. It may be a hobby, a collection, or a creation, but whatever it is you absolutely love doing it. Sharing it with the world on myPassionProject.com can be rewarding, empowering and fun.
I have been working on my Passion Project for the past few months, incubating it from concept to fully-formed idea to an actual website. I have had a blast designing it, developing it, and dreaming of its future possibilities. It has certainly become my Passion Project and I’m happy to finally let everyone see it.
There are already some amazing posts over on the site, so go check it out and be sure to leave some comments or submit something yourself!
On Tuesday night at 6:00pm, at McDee’s Art Center, I’ll be giving a presentation to the Wenatchee chapter of Rotaract.
Rotaract is a professional service, leadership and community service organisation for young men and women between the ages 18-30. Rotaract focuses on the development of young adults as leaders in their communities and workplaces. Clubs around the world also take part in international service projects, in a global effort to bring peace and international understanding to the world. (Wiki)
My presentation will be entitled, “Young Business” and will be both about having a new business and having a business as a young person.
I’ll be posting most of the presentation to the blog over the next week or so, but to hear the real thing make sure you come out to the actual presentation!
Things are going swell here at Apt Design. With a beautiful cool spring we’ve been working outside a lot lately. We’re finishing up some great projects - websites for Gill Diamond Hospitality, new logos, and helping some companies build their identity from the ground up. Its exciting to help create a cohesive brand for a company or program that will allow their visual materials to be a dynamic presentation of who they are. Along the way we’re getting to work with some really great people.
We are also excited about a brand new project that is currently in the works. Can’t give out too much information yet, but we’re building something that will be a lot of fun, look good, and help people share a little about themselves. We’ll let you know when we go live with the soft opening, and you can be an early part of the project!
Apt Design’s business cards for John D. Johnson were recently featured on FaveUp.com. FaveUp is one of the top gallery sites for great new designs from around the world.
Check out the post, and give us a little vote if you feel like it.
Oh, that’s exciting.
Apt Design was recently nominated for the “Best Professional Service Business” award from the Wenatchee Downtown Association. Winners were announced at the WDA’s Annual Banquet.
The eventual winner was the great new Downtown business Belly to Baby. Congratulations to them and thank you to everyone who voted for us!
Here’s a new wallpaper from Apt Design, ready to grace your desktop and remind you of one of the important things in life. It was a fun project to work on, and we hope you enjoy it. So download and pass it around to your friends, and don’t forget to leave a comment letting us know your thoughts!
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Or, if your tastes tend towards the dark and fiery, there’s this one:
The Apt Design website was recently selected as an example of a great, CSS-driven site over at CSS Showcase. We’re proud to have been recognized by such a site, and a big thanks to CSS Showcase for their hard work in continually selecting and presenting great websites to the public.
(And that was even for the old website - wait until they get a look at the new design!)
The office of the future
In the design industry, as in more and more professions these days, geography is no longer a limiting factor in working with clients. Apt has already worked with clients across the country and around the world, but now we are trying something a little different. For the past week we have relocated the office to Northwest Arkansas, part vacation, part experiment in working from anywhere. With a laptop and cell phone, neither we nor any of our clients can tell much of a difference.
This is an increasingly popular way to do business. Freelancer designer and writer Skellie has a blog devoted to this entire issue. Her website Anywired shares stories and gives advice to those looking to have a completely mobile office.
The office of now
Why not try something different today? Get out of the office, take your laptop to a coffee shop or a park, and enjoy the freedom of working from anywhere. If you can’t necessarily move your workspace, find a way to get creative and do things a little different. Let us know about your experiences in the comments.
Last week Apt Design unveiled our new website built on the Content Management System WordPress. We had been using a CMS called Joomla, which is a great platform for building sites, but oftentimes to big and cumbersome for small sites that do a lot of blogging. While we will continue to keep up with updates and advances in both systems and have the capabilities to build sites in both, we will be using WordPress for most of our new sites.
Our site isn’t perfect yet (there is always room for tweaking), but we think the new design is more coherent with our identity. What do you think about the new design? Leave us your opinion in the comments. And don’t forget to subscribe to our RSS feed to get your constant drip of Apt updates, business insights, marketing tips, and links to great design. (If you were subscribed before, you’ll have to subscribe again. Last time, promise.)
This month also marks Apt Design’s 6th month of operations. We’d like to say thanks to all of our clients and business mentors who have helped make Apt a success thus far. We look forward to creating a slightly more beautiful world through great, creative design with you!
the blog has been a bit quiet lately as the apt office has been hard at work.
we’re finishing up a few projects and starting some cool new stuff as well. there is ongoing work that’s keeping us busy, and there is the ever-present challenge to make sure we’re getting maintaining a healthy work/life balance and getting enough time outdoors.
so keep checking back for looks at completed projects, word on apt design’s new target market, and information about how to make your business better.
until then we lift a cup of coffee in your direction and say, “carry on.”
