Three years ago, my friend “Blackie” asked me to make a label for his homemade cocoa powder. I did and it was fun. Fast forward to today: I offered Blackie a print as a thank you for some work he did for me and he asked for a large print of the label. I found it and was… unimpressed with my three-year-old design skills. I spent a few minutes, ten tops, sprucing it up and came up with this.
I’m not saying it’s the Mona Lisa, but it is compared to what it used to look like. This was a great realization, that clearly pointed to forward motion. I feel like a totally different designer than I was then, much less tentative, and much more ready to make mistakes and continue moving forward. Again, it’s not that this image belongs in the next Tufte book, but the difference in my approach was palpable.
