Design 21: Social Design Network

I started my career as a visual artist over 20 years ago. I have worked as a graphic designer, branding consultant and educator on both coasts. After graduating from UCLA I began my design career in Los Angeles in the advertising department of Architectural Digest magazine.

Later, I worked in the entertainment industry on major motion picture campaigns while freelancing for five years at Seiniger Advertising. In the early 1990’s I moved to New York to widen my experience and advance my education in the then emerging new media technologies.

For four years, I attended the school of professional studies at the School of Visual Arts at night while working as a marketing communications director during the day. While at SVA, I had the opportunity to study with world-renowned designer Milton Glaser and legendary typeface designer Ed Benguiat. I have been a member of the New York Art Director's Club since 2000 and American Institute of Graphic Arts since 2006.

In 1998 I founded Synergy Creative on the belief that collaboration is key to success. I know that one of my strengths is organizing creative teams. I have learned that one skilled person can accomplish a lot, but the collaboration of many diverse creative individuals is magical. The result is a smart, unique, creative message that is delivered in the most targeted media for reaching key consumers.

I currently live in San Diego Ca. and teach at the Art Institute of California - SD where I put this philosophy to work in the classroom. I continue to help facilitate collaborations between different disciplines such as media arts and animation, fashion, interior design, culinary, advertising and graphic design. I recently worked with a team of faculty advisers, for a student project to brand an upcoming culinary event sponsored by the world-renowned Chaine des Rotisseurs, an international culinary society. The event will take place in San Diego in 2010. For more information check out the Chaine student project. Here is a video clip from a project I helped spearhead at the Art Institute, a collaboration between interior design, culinary and graphic design aptly named Crossing Palettes.

In my freelance design work, I use the latest social media marketing technologies as well as traditional media to offer our clients cohesive communication strategies. In addition to founding Synergy Creative in 1998, in 1979 I co-founded, the Palange Theater in Van Nuys, California, later known as the West End Playhouse. I am currently a partner in a vacation rental business Hilltop House Vacations, located in Gold Beach Oregon. Last year I launched my own brand of handcrafted jewelry under the brand name Baubles...Bling!. At the end of 2009 I was retained by First Nations Capital Partners as their Director of Corporate Communications.