The Regional Geriatric Program of Toronto is located in Sunnybrook Hospital. The RGP is part of a province-wide network providing services to those in need of geriatric programs and services working in collaboration with primary care physicians and community health professionals.

The RGP of Toronto contacted me in 2007 to work on a redesign of their Annual Report which they felt needed an update. The resulting report gave a fresh new look to their reports and since then I have been working with them every year to produce the report along with an accompanying PowerPoint template.

BFdesign’s aesthetic talent results in a professional and creative product which caters to its clients’ needs.

Marlene Award, Director, Administration & Information Management, RGP Toronto

Cavalcade of Lights is an annual winter tradition in Toronto. It kicks off the holiday season at City Hall with the lighting of the giant Christmas Tree in Nathan Philips Square along with a concert with various musical talents from Toronto and ends off in a spectacular fireworks display set off from the roof of City Hall. Millions of Torontonians partake in the event every year.

For the 2010 event, I was asked to help create a more visually appealing identity for Cavalcade of Lights. The event has been around for over 25 years and the Special Events team at the City were looking to update the look of the identity.

Working with a wordmark which had already been approved, my task was to create a visual image that created a sense of celebration, joy and excitement. What we ended up with was a cascade of lights in festive colours. The Team was able to use the wordmark with or without the cascade depending on their needs. On the eve of the event, it was great to see the visual element used throughout the square as it had a real impact on the identity of the event.

Our department produces large scale public festivals and events for the City of Toronto. We’ve worked with BFdesign on a variety of projects, from making films that boost our social media outreach, to the creation of visual and innovative brand identities that really make our event products POP! It’s always a pleasure working with Blair – he consistently delivers creative work on time and on budget, and has become one of our most trusted ‘go to’ suppliers.

Giannina Warren, Media Relations, Economic Development & Culture

After 8 years of working on important issues such as the environment and highlighting emerging leaders in Toronto, the Toronto City Summit Alliance recently underwent a rebranding process to become the Greater Toronto CivicAction Alliance.

The project was undertaken by Trajectory (disclosure: my parents run Trajectory) – a branding agency in Toronto. I was contracted to help in the redesign of their website. The resulting design, above, was implemented by another agency. The relaunch was hugely successful and I was happy to be apart of the project!

Tight budgets. Tight timeframes. BF Design tackled the design of the CivicAction website with the kind of design and web savvy that anticipated many of our needs before we even thought to ask. It’s a collaborative approach that makes for great work and delighted clients.

- Jeannette Hanna, Vice President, Trajectory

Over the past two years, I’ve been contracted by Playwrights Canada Press to design three book covers for some of their plays. The three pictured above are by some of the most prolific writers and performers Canada has to offer; Sky Gilbert, Maja Ardal and Anusree Roy. After reading the scripts for each play(s) and consulting with Playwrights Canada Press, a few sample covers were designed and passed on to the artists. I think the resulting designs are striking and communicate visually the content of the plays quite well.

I’ve quite enjoyed designing book covers. The cover for You Fancy Yourself by Maja Ardal is actually from a poster I designed for the show a few years ago. The show has toured extensively across the country and internationally as well.

I am always delighted with the work BFdesign does on our book covers. We are given several options to choose from, all of which are superb, and the final product goes a long way in creating the right image for our books.

I strongly recommend BFdesign, for both the design expertise that is brought to the work and the high level of professionalism.

- Annie Gibson, Publisher

In 2008, my friend Katherine and I decided that we wanted to share our love of culture in Toronto through a video blog. Being young artists, we didn’t have a lot of cash, so we thought why not try and do as many fun things as we can without spending a lot of money in one night! That was the push behind creating That Night in Toronto. We managed to do about 20 episodes and had a blast doing them. Some of my favourites are posted here, but you can check out the site or our blip.tv channel for all the episodes!

Prelude to Nuit Blanche

Coverage of Nuit Blanche

Skating at Harbourfront Centre

Creative Trust is an arts service organization based in Toronto which, as they say, “using collaboration and shared learning to help performing arts companies.” I have worked with the Creative Trust in various capacities in the past, presenting a workshop on social media for their members and collaborating on workshops while I worked at the Toronto Alliance for the Performing Arts.

The Creative Trust has had the same website since its inception many years ago and it was time for a refresh. The focus of the organization is shifting and they wanted to refresh the look of the site as well as provide a section for resources along with a more dynamic blog to keep everyone abreast of events and changes in the sector.

The Team and I worked on creating a new clean and aesthetically pleasing site which would also allow them to update the content on their own (a much needed feature). After a couple of months working together, we were able to launch the new site in January and it has been a great success for all involved.

The rebranding of BFdesign has begun!

After 3 years of designing for others, I’ve decided it was time to shake things up internally and began redesigning myself and the company. One thing I hear over and over from freelancers is the fact that it’s so difficult to find time to actually market oneself because we are constantly busy doing it for our clients.

With my upcoming departure to the UK, I decided that now was the right time to rebrand. The image here is a sneak peak at the redesign of my website and new brand which will be launched in early January, 2011. I’m really excited about the relaunch and looking forward to repositioning the company in the coming months.

One of the first things to do is to get new business cards! As mentioned on my Posterous site, I decided to go with Tanya at Snap + Tumble to produce some letterpress business cards – something a bit different and elegant.

Today she sent me photos of the manually cut cards as they’re ready to be picked up. The photos literally brought a smile to my face when I saw them! I can’t wait to get my hands on them. The photos here are of the plate she used to create the cards along with a shot of the cards themselves.

One word: sexy.

I’ve been working on revamping the overall brand for BFdesign for the past 4 months and I’m happy to announce that it’s pretty much done now. The website is up, the new logo is confirmed and has been receiving some great positive feedback and the company position is pretty much nailed down. An exciting day indeed.

Originally I was going to use the site as a blog as well, but I’ve decided to keep it slightly separate and am keeping up the BFdesign Blog over at Posterous (a really great quick blogging platform).

I have to say a huge thank you to Ever Hobbes, coder extraordinaire, for putting up with my nit-picky notes and helping bring the site to life. And also a massive thanks to Yvonne Bambrick for snapping a few photos of yours truly for the site.

Now that things are up and running here, I hope to be posting more work in the next couple of weeks and as projects are completed. Thanks for stopping by! I look forward to hearing from you.

This past November, on a sunny Saturday, was the unveiling of the Off Bathurst Theatre District in Toronto, a project of the Toronto Alliance for the Performing Arts (TAPA). The project includes the installation of banners all the way up Bathurst Street from King Street West to St. Clair Avenue West. BFdesign was contracted to design the banners to help promote the three theatres involved in the project, the Factory Theatre, Tarragon Theatre and Theatre Passe Muraille. The banners alternate as they progress up the street with every other banner reversing to the back so as you progress up Bathurst, you see both the front and the back.

Pictured above is the Executive Director of TAPA, Jacoba Knaapen along with myself at the unveiling of the banners infront of the Tarragon Theatre.

The Chang School is the continuing education department of Ryerson University. I’ve been working with them since 2008 on a variety of projects such as the Silver Screen Arts Festival, their Leaders in Learning award ceremony, as well as various marketing pieces for newspapers and internally. I was able to work with the team a the Chang School in creating the 2010/2011 course book. The layout of the 464 page book was one of the biggest undertakings in layout design that I’ve ever worked on, but the outcome was incredibly positive for all parties involved.

Since 2008, The Chang School’s Marketing and Communications unit has had the pleasure of working with BFdesign on a variety of projects – from small ads and postcards to large-scale publications. Blair has consistently provided creative, professional solutions that align with our brand and meet our design needs. We are also very happy with the high level of service BFdesign provides – no job is too big or too small, and we can always expect a friendly and efficient response.

Marketing and Communications Team, The Chang School, Ryerson University