Is it really mid-October already? Time sure flies when you're having fun. While there is barely any visible evidence of the changing of seasons here in San Diego (it's currently around 85 outside and perfect for a beach day), I like to at least pretend it is a new season by wearing a sweater (yes, I'm burning up right now) and updating the site with summer work from the summer. Today I posted new design projects for Bethany Dillon, a country release with Curb Records for Steve Holy, and a to-die-for luxury estate you can own a piece of in Lake Arrowhead. Check it out!

Over the past couple of years I have toyed with the thought of diving deeper into the illustration world. After all, I graduated art school with a concentration in Illustration and take on a large variety of hand-drawn projects every month. So why do they get such a small section on the website? They should have room to be seen! Instead of diving into another website re-design (read: time consuming) I have decided for now to showcase my illustration works on another site as well as here. The site is a work in progress (aren't they all?) and will continue to have illustrations added as projects are completed. Check out my Illustrated Works here.

I am always available and eager to take on illustration projects from publishing to editorial to spot illustrations for whatever you need. Just give me a call!

I was so honored to be asked by San Diego Magazine to be one of 6 local artists and designers chosen to create a cover option for their "Best of San Diego" magazine cover. I still consider myself new to the area after a little over a year here and somewhat unknown to the San Diego creative community, so I was so excited to be chosen to participate.

With only about a week to come up with designs in the midst of an already crazy busy work season, I end up with 3 completely unique designs that I was proud of and turned in. The creative team at San Diego Magazine decided to do an online poll to pick the cover, allowing the viewers to chose their favorite. In the end, my illustrated cover earned second place with around 25% of the votes (the winner had something like 30%....so close!) so while you won't be able to see my illustration on next month's cover, hopefully some SoCal people will discover The Visual Republic for the first time because of this contest.

This past month was filled to the brim with photo shoots, partnering every time with my talented husband, photographer Jason Ward. The shoots varied from fashion to musicians to adventure-lifestyle, giving us a wide variety of ideas to pull for. While Jason had the most important job of taking the photos, I stayed busy art directing. To see more of these shoots, check out the Art Direction section of this site and then check out Jason's photography site here.

This has been an exciting month! On top of working on awesome projects like album packaging for The Judds (they are country legends, after all... and some of my mom's favorites), helping out with a photo shoot for Jedidiah, a rad clothing company, I also was featured in San Diego Magazine. This month's issue is all about the neighborhoods of San Diego and they wanted to show neighborhood pride. They had heard through a friend about a poster I had designed for Leucadia, the funky surf town that I call home. I had originally designed the screenprinted poster for a small backyard art show and event. I was thrilled when the magazine asked if they could include the poster in their feature. Of course I said yes! I've only lived in San Diego for a year so getting noticed by this magazine was extra special to me.

The poster is featured in the March issue of San Diego Magazine which is out now. You can purchase this limited edition screenprint here.

I've had the idea to incorporate a line drawing with a photo for a few years now. I know that I've shown it on more than one cd cover comp but none ever made it to the final cover...until now. I am SO excited about this album release, not only because I'm proud of the final packaging art, but also because Francesca's music is really, really good.

The whole album took on an illustrated quality as each of the photos morphs in and out of drawings to photography and back to drawings. It was so fun (and tedious...and time-consuming...but mostly fun) to work on and only increased my ideas for how to push this idea even further into new ways. I so wish I could show you the whole packaging but you will just have to wait a few more weeks until the release. Until then. enjoy just a peek at Franny B's new record.

I'm always excited when Lifeway calls me to do a project. Not only do they have a great sense of design style, but they give me a lot of freedom to create. Their young adults division, called Threads, particularly excites me. I love their fresh, organic style. I've been fortunate enough to design a variety of things for them over the years including book covers, illustrations for journals and spreads for magazines.

When they contacted me most recently to design these latest magazine spreads, I was super excited. Not only were the article topics interesting (the first about things to do before you kick the bucket and the other about why we fall in love), but I was going to get to ILLUSTRATE them! Gotta love that. So I curled up on the couch with my sketchbook and pencils and got to work. This is how they turned out.

Happy New Year! It's amazing how fast 2010 went by although looking back at the year, I shouldn't be so surprised. Today I took a look back at ALL of the projects I worked on last year. I have a small collection of them up on the home page.

What an amazing year it was of pop, rock, indie, gospel and Christmas records, several book cover designs, half a dozen magazine articles illustrated, surf posters created and photo shoots art directed. I designed a record for a legend -- Amy Grant -- drew a LOT more for clients, gave hot pink a chance (and loved it!) for Natalie Grant's new album and spent many hours creating dark and edgy composite covers for the non-pink loving rock albums. I married a talented photographer and dove back into art directing for bands, fashion and lifestyle shoots and even moved west to sunny California, learned to surf (kind of) and fell in love with everything surf culture.

I'm looking forward to another great year in 2011 with a few goals and resolutions of sorts:
1. design, draw and paint what I want to and not just wait I'm paid to
2. art direct photo shoots more
3. collaborate MORE with my husband on photo shoots
4. find awesome new clients that excite and inspire me
5. surf more
6. blog more
7. replace this dirty old keyboard

Happy New Year, friend!
-Alexis

Every year Christmas comes a bit early in our offices. This year, I was working on two Christmas albums by mid-July, annoying my husband by humming along to their seasonal tracks. Thankfully, both albums each took a different take on Christmas--Point of Grace wanted to look classic and cozy while North Point Church wanted a clean, modern approach. In the end, they couldn't look more different. Today I want to show off Point of Grace's newest release which will leave you feeling quite merry. Enjoy!

I love designing book covers almost as much as I love to read a good book. This book by Jason Hayes is all about walking by faith. You're gonna have to wait to see the final cover--it will still be some time before Lifeway releases this gem to stores--but until then I thought you'd like a peek at some of TVR's favorite rejects.