I'm a firm believer in good continuous research equating to great design. Upon accepting this new project to design a one pager for "Jane Doe" I quickly realized I need to go an extra mile, or 48 in this case, to visit the Nike store in Huntington Beach.

I arrived to the Nike store and was very impressed by their setup. At the writing of this 3/3/15 this is the NEWEST and ONLY Nike retail space that has a yoga studio inside. The product is women's only, and it alsy has a lot of unique visual elements. Quickly, I spoke to the staff, checked out the product and shot off a few reference photos. Jane seeks a role in which she will be managing and developing retail experiences like these. Specifically, she is looking to work with pilot programs and this trip will prove to add value to her one pager.

Spending maybe 15 minutes in the store I wanted to dart away to record my thoughts and took off the local Yard House. As a freelancer I enjoy the ability to bring my work with me and change my creative environment. Here I went back to the questionaire I asked Jane to fill out for me before I agreed to create a one pager for her. I also got her on the phone to clarify some new ideas that came to me while visiting the Nike store.

During my intial 15 minute visit I found out there was a NTC workout with spots available that same night. I registered and came back to sweat it out with their team. Unknowingly, I bumped into a friend and was able to workout with some of the sales associates in the store in addition to their hired professional trainer. This insight and first-hand experience helps me draw upon the personal experience I had with NIke as a consumer and better understand the expectations and culture of the company she will be interviewing for.

I was having a creative block when I woke up this morning and decided to put something healthy in my body before I start. (I don't drink coffee) Your health is the most important. If you aren't healthy and feeling your best you won't do your best work. What is your favorite juicing recipe?

Before I made the drive down I asked Jane what Nike product excites her. She mentioned several items. In my questionnaire I also asked her what colors she feel best expresses her. Lucky for me there was one such product that shared some of both traits. I purchased the running tights and picked up a look book. What I'm going for her is immersion. Surrounded by the product I take back to her resume and start making connections while jotting notes and making thumbnails of ideas.

Using Pantone to color match the actual product. Yet another advantage to working with live references instead of just googling it. I did however keep my receipt and plan to return it before the completion of the project.

Having gained a lot of insights and inspiration from my store visits and thumbnails I'm eager to see how some of these ideas look on the computer.

My first step in the computer is to get all the good graphic ideas roughed out. and look up my pantones just to have them on the art board as a reference while I'm moving things around. As far as layout goes, the only thing I know I want is this pants tag to be at the top right of the page. I haven't thought about color placement or anything else for that matter.

A few moments later in Illustrator, I'm starting to populate the page with items that stand out. The "hang tag" is complete, but filled with dummy text toward the bottom. I just realized to make the Nike side portrait and the Pacers Running Stores landscape. This was a conscious thought because I want the information to be viewed in a different way.

When designing graphics, I strive to base my designs on something authentic. For Jane, it was appropriate to reference a New York Marathon bib because that was the race she was currently training for. She will be going for a personal best this fall.

Close up of my rendition.

Several hours into design my goal is to populate the page and plan out the pacing and placement of information. While some of the info looks cool a lot of it is dummy info or needs to be further clarified. I often squint my eyes to make sure the levels of information are reading in a harmonious way. Squinting here, I can easily see there is far too much black on the right side of the pink page. I'll need to change that.

Dialing in the details a bit more by using place holder text as well as dummy graphs. At this stage I know the info I want to illustrate, but haven't yet figured out where.