Zipper 8 Lighting Design

Friday Greetings Everyone!

So I've recently been working on some new inspirations, and more specifically ideas for creating my new line of lights. Here's the first one I created. It isn't perfect, but I'm pretty happy with the first effort! I hope you like it, and stay tuned for more new lamps to be appearing soon, both here and at my Etsy shop. And of course don't forget to check out all the new inventory at: http://www.etsy.com/shop/Zipper8Design

Cheers!! Allison

Photo Editing Tips 1

Happy Tuesday Everyone,

As I mentioned in my post yesterday, I've been taking new photos of my products, and even though I bought a daylight bulb, they are coming out a bit pink-yellow-ish. So I've been editing them in photoshop, and found a great quick fix, so I wanted to pass on the techniques I've learned so far.

Oh, and my photos are on a white background, which is why this works. Just putting that out there.

When you open the photo in Photoshop, go up to the Color Balance (Image-Adjustments-Color Balance). Then you have to make sure you switch from effecting Midtones, to Highlights. This way the color balance change will primarily effect the white background, and not the color of your actual product. (If you need to tweak the color of your product, you can play around with changing the Midtones and Shadows toggles too.)

Here's is the original photo:

Then, simply increase the top slider towards Cyan, and increase the bottom slider towards Blue. You need to move both sliders because they balance each other out, towards a purer white.

Here's the photo once you increase the Cyan slider:

Here's the final photo, once you increase the Blue slider as well:

I hope this is helpful! I just wanted to pass along this tip since I've found that it has helped me a lot in the past two days.

Good luck! And thanks for reading, Allison

Etsy Shop Revamp

Happy Monday!

Much to Basel's chagrin, Monday means its back to work. We're back from a wonderful week in Connecticut, and its time to get back on track, updating my Etsy shop. We made our first sale two weeks ago and I can't wait to make our second sale soon! But to make that happen I've been working on some major overhauls, including brand new photos and listings!

This is our new 'set', its all about a professional look, right! So that means its all about a cohesive, branded shop. I'm hoping these new product photos will help add to that look, bringing a more calm and professional vibe to my store. The white background with the touch of wood as a backdrop should let the coasters POP while including a quiet touch of color and pattern.

Come back over the next few days to see which new amazing products will be popping up next! I plan on adding a set or two of coasters each day for at least the next 4 days. So keep checking back for the latest and greatest additions from Zipper 8 Design.

Featured here are our adorable Puppy Paw Print coasters, with bee caps from the Thomas Kemper Soda Company in the center.

Cheers! A

Capture a Piece of Your Wedding Forever

I'm going to start out right up front by saying that I have never been married. However, I was the maid-of-honor in my college roommate's wedding, so I do have some first hand knowledge of the topic. And here's one cardinal rule I learned.

Everyone wants their wedding to be special, and no one wants to let go.

I wasn't even the bride but I carefully hung my bouquet to dry, and made a whole fancy shadow box featuring the invitation, the little guest gifts, and a piece of the dried flowers I'd saved. But, except in this somewhat useless shadow box, I was suddenly left with this beautiful bouquet of dried hydrangeas, that I really didn't need.

If only I had started my business back then I would have had a great idea for what to do with those flowers. What about making them into a wonderful and totally functional set of coasters!! Now I'm still learning the art of pressing flowers, but so far I've been able to make some pretty great floral coasters.

In fact, one of my favorite sets of coasters happens to be these, made out of blue and purple hydrangeas, the exact flower featured in my roommate's wedding! They just had their fifth anniversary, and I think the next time I see her I may give her a set of these coasters, just to bring back all those memories.

So if you are a bride, and you think that one of my floral sets of coasters matches your wedding flowers nicely, consider using them as bridesmaids gifts. Or, contact me and together we can work on using the actual flowers from your bouquet to make some very special, priceless, and of course functional keepsakes!

Colorful Eggs

Happy Saturday Everyone!

Basel and I are up early this morning, because he's still learning the art of sleeping through the night, and I realized that it was the perfect time to post a photo that I had forgotten about before. Look how beautiful these farm fresh eggs are, and they are just as delicious as they are colorful! I hope you are all sleeping in or having an otherwise restful Saturday morning. I'll be back later with a more substantial post.

Cheers!! Allison

Bridal Giveaway at Hill City Bride

A quick second post for the day to talk up this great giveaway being done by Hill City Bride, in combination with Bebe Sniklefritz for a set of 5 absolutely ADORABLE little mirrors that make perfect bride's gifts, or gifts for any other occasion!

http://www.hillcitybride.com/2010/07/giveaway-from-bebe-sniklefritz/

So check out this awesome giveaway, and come back tomorrow for some more random insights from me!

Cheers! Allison

Visit Zipper8Design on Etsy!

Friday Greetings!

I just wanted to remind everyone to check out our awesome Etsy store, using the new link on the right. Just click the dog and shop away! Our store will be growing starting on Monday, with all new photos and products being listed, but for now here's a preview of some of the better photos to come.

Cheers!!

Living Healthy, Wealthy and Wise?

Well, I don't know about the wise part, and I am certainly a long way off from the wealthy, but I am doing my best to live healthy!!!

While I've been up in Connecticut for the week we've been enjoying the most amazing local foods. Not only are they nutritious and delicious, but they are beautiful too! Check out these amazing heirloom summer squash! They were the most vibrant beautiful yellow on the outside and then had these pretty pale green seeds inside. YUM!!!

But part of living healthy is knowing how to make food that are good for you taste good too! One of my favorite summer meals is a lean pork tenderloin grilled on the barbeque, so its just a slight pale pink inside, and then served with a wonderful homemade fruit salsa. This one we made with mango, nectarines, red onion, yellow pepper, and avocado. So good, and beautiful too!!! I'm basing my healthier lifestyle on weight watchers' core plan, and all of these foods are 100% core approved!

And finally, a simple dish but one that was just too beautiful to not mention, heirloom cherry tomatoes with fresh basil and a little bit of fresh mozzarella cheese. Look at that amazing purple color! The plate here is just showing the purple tomatoes, but the box itself was really beautiful because the tomatoes came in this purple color, orange and red! They were really pretty, and they tasted absolutely amazing too.

Does anyone else have any healthy and delicious summer foods that they love?

His name is Basel, not Basil. He's a puppy not an herb...

Right now I'm spending an idyllic week in Connecticut with my new puppy Basel! He's a mini dachshund and just turned 10 weeks old on Tuesday. He weighed 3 whole pounds last week at the vet, and is just the cutest little thing imaginable. I absolutely adore him, and am so glad I decided to get him this summer when I'll have time at home.

As you can see from the photos he's chocolate and tan, and he's a long haired dachshund so he's super soft and fuzzy and will hopefully have silky hair that will be nice for cuddling with! (But he also has smooth hair ancestry so he shouldn't have fur that is too super long, dragging on the ground and such.)

Yesterday we went for a walk, and he met his second cat. This one was about 4 times his size! And, because this cat lives in a house that also breeds dachshunds, she recognized a similar puppy and came trotting right over to say hi. Basel was not a fan, he seemed pretty freaked out! Then again I would too if this animal ran at me and was 4 times my size!

I'm sure I'll have lots of photos to post over the next many months, so I just wanted to introduce you all early on to the bundle of joy sleeping on the couch next to me right now.

Cheers! Allison

Welcome!

Hello and Welcome to my blog! I am a 26 year old, recent architecture school graduate, living in New York City, and amongst other things I'm trying to start my own design firm, Zipper 8 Design.

I have always loved good design, especially products for the home, and so last summer when classes were over, and I had some extra resin lying around the house, I decided to see what I could make with it. And that's how my very first ever Beer Cap Trivet was born. That first trivet is clunky, used a ton of resin, and a lot of very unique bottle caps, plus it has a slightly frosted sort of look. But, it holds a special place in my heart because it was the first. (I'll post a pic here later, stay tuned to see my first attempt at product design!) From there it was a quick step towards better trivets, thinner, slightly smaller, and super clear. And idea had been born! My friend Katie and I jumped on it, and quickly started brainstorming what else you could do with bottle caps. Did you know there's a huge market on Ebay to purchase old beer bottle caps? Neither did I, but I soon learned and was buying up all the fun caps I could find. (And there of course is my first mistake... spending so much money on caps when I could have just started collecting them from friends!)

From there we decided that while trivets were super fun, coasters would be even better! And then came the first major hurdle in the process. What the hell do you use as a mold for making coasters? Katie headed off on a summer road trip and I started researching anything and EVERYTHING we could possibly use as a mold. It took a lot of trial and error, but finally I got it! And then and there Zipper 8 Design was officially born.

Don't worry, I'm not going to bore you with endless talk about my business all the time, for that you can visit the more official Zipper 8 Design blog (http://zipper8design.blogspot.com). The purpose of starting this blog is to discuss more personal issues, things that come to mind, other amazing artists and the like. I hope you enjoy what you see here, thanks for reading!!

Allison