Seasons Greetings and Happy New Year from all of us at Pica Design and please remember to Txt Responsibly with all of your new gizmos and gadgets this holiday season:) Please enjoy this slideshow featuring Pica Design highlights from 2009.

What a better way to celebrate the holidays than to help spread peace through Blueberry and Strawberry Preserves. Peace Preserves, a Client of Pica Design, is a local business that was created to provide an array of unique fundraising items to nonprofit organizations and the retail market. Products were developed as a vehicle to express the simple message to “Spread Peace, Peace Works”. When you buy their products, you send funds directly to youth organizations who are working towards achieving peace in our world today. To learn more on Pica Design’s involvement in helping Peace Preserves to develop their brand identity and packaging, click here. To purchase Peace Preserves for gifts or for your holiday enjoyment, you can visit a variety of local establishments such as the Farmers Fare, the Belfast Co-op, Whole Foods in Portland or directly through the Peace Preserves website . Enjoy!

TxtResponsibly.org (the idea and the website) was created by the staff at Pica Design. Hearing news stories about the dangers of texting while driving, the statistics started to sink in: a distracted driver is 23 times more likely to cause a car accident than an undistracted driver, according to the recent VirginiaTech Transportation Institute Study. To put this into a more familiar context, drunk drivers are 7 times more likely to cause a car accident than sober drivers. The mission of the organization is to raise awareness of the dangers of texting while driving and to prevent harmful injury or death caused by the act of texting recklessly. Would you take the oath? Visit www.txtresponsibly.org.

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All words have a meaning, but good ones come with more than one,
When we picked the Pica name we took on quite a sum.
The many things a Pica is may be more than you think
So we thought we’d share with you all these handy links

Pica means a family of magpies, and a publisher of old
Red-wine grapes that wind and grow in the region of Garonne
There’s a city found in Chile, a pianist named Joe,
and the pathway to your brain through which the blood does flow
The urge to eat things not quite food goes by Pica too
But we hope you stick to food, good health it brings to you!

There are Institutes of Art in Portland and in Perth
And the heat shield on a spaceship so very far from Earth,
If you should twist and turn the ‘c’ into a ‘k’
And head into the mountains, way up above the fray
You may find a cousin to the rabbit, with ears just like a mouse
Who live in rocky hillsides, and whistle when they’re roused

But what we meant, in any case, was the measurement of space
Six picas in an inch to grant us design grace.

Micah Ellis

For the past few years I have had the benefit of witnessing countless children enjoying the winged tricycle out my office window. Every summer the hordes of tourists descend on Belfast, Maine. Every child that sees this tricycle has to sit on it and ring the bell. Usually this is a 10-15 minute event. I hear the wonderful sounds of laughter and screaming children as they take turns trying to push the pedals and make those wings go up and down, up and down. I can think of nothing better to brighten up a rainy summer than happy children.

But on this particular day I looked out my window only to see a co-worker screaming with delight. In this instance a picture really is worth a thousand words.

Don’t forget to stop in Belfast on your way up the Maine coast and check out all the bike installations throughout town.

Timm Schamberger / DDP

We regularly get people asking us what our hold music is. It isn’t often that people like to be on hold. Since we added Dave Brubeck’s Take Five as our hold music, people have regularly commented on it. Sometimes even asking to be put back on hold so they could hear the rest of the song. The following is a short story on Brubeck’s Take Five album that appeared on NPR.

Dave Brubeck: An Unlikely Hit, 50 Years Strong

All Things Considered, June 12, 2009 – In 1959, jazz pianist Dave Brubeck topped the pop charts and shook up the notion of rhythm in jazz with an odd-metered song called “Take Five.”
Only trained musicians might understand exactly what gave the Paul Desmond-penned song its flow. It was all in the time signature: five beats to the measure, a departure from more traditional four-four time in jazz. It was cutting-edge and cool — a song millions would scoop up and savor. In an interview with Michele Norris, Brubeck explains what made the time signature so difficult.

“You were brought up playing in four-four,” Brubeck says. “Everybody could walk to it and dance to it. Put an extra beat on it — everybody’s tripping.”

Fifty years ago, “Take Five” appeared on Time Out, a title that served as a double-entendre. Those in the know knew it referenced the mood and the music’s meter.

At age 89, Brubeck has slowed down, but he’s still playing and writing music.

“The more you get to play, the better it is — just play as you can while you can,” Brubeck says. “I can’t wait for the next job so we can play.”

A few weeks ago we shared our excitement about the letter ‘O’ and how we accepted the challenge to create the letter using found or re-purposed materials for the 2009 AIGA BoNE Show in Boston. Well, our efforts were well received and unique in that we submitted the only entry that used 100% organic materials. In this case, hay and twine. Ultimately, our ‘O’ was auctioned off to a bidder longing for Maine and now hangs proudly on a sun porch. Here are a handful of pictures of the project in the making and the final installation. Thanks to all who participated. Enjoy!

We Bring You the 'O'

Final Installation at Mass College of Art in Boston. Can you find our 'O'?

Matt O’Malia, principal of G•O Logic, LLC, has a fantastic editorial on Roll Call this week, in which he calls for a stronger energy standard in the upcoming American Clean Energy and Security Act.

“Buildings consume 40 percent of the energy produced in the United States, more energy than all of the cars on the roads today. And while automobile fuel efficiency is seriously debated as a path to save energy and money, building energy performance has not received as much scrutiny, even though we have the tools and technology to create super-efficient buildings today. A strong renewable electricity standard will mean these tools get used and these jobs created to make our buildings more efficient and begin to build the foundation of an American new energy economy.”

Read the whole editorial here: http://www.rollcall.com/news/36132-1.html

For more on Matt and G•O Logic’s houses, check out their website at www.gologichomes.com

Thoughtful and clever marketing that does the trick. Good branding and great execution.