Peter Hill Design Receives 10 America Graphic Design Awards From GD USA for Design, Web & Branding Work

Minneapolis, Minn. – Peter Hill Design has been named a winner of multiple 2013 American Graphic Design Awards by Graphic Design USA (GDUSA) Magazine for various graphic design, branding, logo, and web design projects. GDUSA recognizes a selective, top 15 percent with a certificate of excellence. This national competition receives over 8,000 entries each year from members of the design and advertising community.

Peter Hill Design’s winning client entries included a rebranding and website for a Minneapolis law firm’s rebrand; logo, naming, branding and website for a retail consultant; branding and website for a Los Angeles furniture designer; a book cover design for an upcoming fiction author; branding and campaign development for an emerging art organization touting an outdoor opera; a wedding invitation design for an exclusive, Colorado mountain wedding; and a retro, 50-year class reunion invitation for a Wisconsin high school.

Other award-winning projects included two agency self-promotion pieces. The first was last year’s holiday gift, which was mailed to over 100 clients. It included handcrafted high-end, chocolate and marshmallows on stir sticks in custom-designed coffee mug that said ‘Sip’. The second was a ‘fresh’ brochure featuring high-quality food photography and creative writing to introduce the agency to new prospects.

Megan Junius, President & Creative Director of Peter Hill Design said, “It’s an honor to have our work nationally recognized in our industry. We are very excited to have collaborated with all these great client and strong brands.”

The detailed list of awards is as follows:

• Henson & Efron, P.A.; rebrand
• Retail Insights Group; branding, website and logo
• Kim Salmela; 1-logo, 1-website
• No Such Thing As Evil By Andrew Hunkins; book cover 
• Mill City Summer Opera; 2013 Barber of Seville playbill 
• Kristen & Michael Nuptials; wedding invitations 
• Newman High School Class Reunion; invitations 
• Peter Hill Design; “Sip” 2012 Holiday Gift Self-Promotion 
• Peter Hill Design; “Fresh” Self-Promotion Brochure 

“Peter Hill Design is tremendously talented and I enjoyed working with them on my brand development and website,” said client Robert George, President of Retail Insights Group. “They were able to bring my vision of the company to life. Their strategic insight was key in starting my own consulting group after 25 years of industry experience. The results I’ve had since my brand launch has exceeded my expectations.”

“Peter Hill Design’s graphic design work inspired the entire Mill City team to put on the best show possible,” said Karen Brooks, founder and board director, Mill City Summer Opera. “Their work was so striking, it created tremendous buzz for our company as we launched the 2013 season. I am proud to have them as a partner in our success.”

Peter Hill Design is led by Megan Junius, who has been president and creative director of the agency since 2011 when she purchased the business from Peter Hill. Megan is a native of Des Moines, Iowa and a graduate of the College of Saint Benedict/Saint John’s University in St. Joseph, Minn.  She has over 12 years of agency experience and has designed award winning promotions and packaging earning recognition from GDUSA and AIGA. Her collaborative leadership style helps produce strong, creative results for clients of all sizes. The firm’s services include a wide range of marketing and design services. Other team members on the award-winning projects include Allison Krogstad, Whitney Dierks, and Katie Provenzano.

About Graphic Design USA

Since 1963, GDUSA has been the monthly news magazine for the professional design community including graphic designers and other creative professionals. The American Graphic Design Awards is a national, four-decade old flagship competition and is open to everyone in the graphic arts community.

About Peter Hill Design

Peter Hill Design, established 1994, is a design, marketing and advertising firm specializing in targeted brand development, digital marketing, and web design. Since its founding, the agency has grown to include a wide variety of consumer and B2B clients on a national scale with clients such as Disney Garden, Newman’s Own Organics, Career Quest Learning Centers and Hotel Maison. Locally, the firm works with a number of professional service firms including Wellington Management, JBL Companies, Larson • King, LLP, and Burke & Thomas, PLLP. Recent projects include a national consumer product launch, online promotional videos, and digital and print advertising campaigns.

For more information regarding Peter Hill Design, please contact 612.925.1927 or mjunius@peterhilldesign.com and visit www.peterhilldesign.com.

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Monogramming Madness

From iPad covers to dishes, everything has a monogram lately. Pottery Barn features a whole online monogram shop with towels, table linens, glasses, picture frames and jewelry boxes. Etsy.com features baby clothes, linens, wall art, hats, soaps and even decorative pillows. Home décor catalogs are showing headboards, lampshades and bedspreads with monograms.

Giving newly married couple monogrammed gifts isn’t a new idea, but decorating our homes and offices with our initials is a current trend. Since when do we need to have our initials on everything we own? I doubt it is because we think we might lose our belongings. In this mass-produced world we live in, it just might give us a sense of having something uniquely hand-made and exclusively “ours” as it incorporates our own personal flair.

Monogrammed or personalized stationery has been popular for a while, but using an initial as a personal trademark is a trend that looks like is here to stay. It gives something a personal touch – a kind of human ‘territory marking’.

Back in the Victorian era, monograms symbolized the upper class. Those in higher classes adapted the monogram as a symbol of their place in society. Today, corporations often shorten their names to initials and then use the monogram as a design element. Law, engineering, consulting and architecture firms often go for this approach as their firm names are commonly made up of three last names and one is sure to be too many syllables!

For instance, it is much easier to use the shortened ‘PWC’ instead of ‘Price Waterhouse Coopers’. The space that the full three-word name takes up for a logo or design element is quiet long. But do big scrolling initial letters as a design element really say anything about what service or product a company offers? An embroidered ‘LK’ on a golf shirt doesn’t immediately read top-rated law firm or a brochure with a BKV doesn’t necessarily say ‘award-winning architecture firm’. Just like an appliquéd pink “M” on my briefcase doesn’t mean anything if you don’t know my name. But people are drawn to monograms because they give a sense of personal pride. My briefcase screams, “I am ‘M’!” A monogram then becomes a personal logo of sorts.

When it comes to this monogramming madness craze, less is more. One article of clothing or an accessory works but embracing this trend throughout our home décor becomes overkill. Linens are one thing but soaps, pillows, lamps AND a bathmat? What’s happens when you want to donate that “W” pillow to Goodwill? These items become harder to reuse for sure. Using company monograms as a design element can work too but used in the right instance. A simple watermark on a letterhead done correctly can be beautiful but using initials in a direct mail piece probably isn’t the best marketing idea. Let’s remember that not everyone always knows what those letters stand for!