Chris Davey

Working in collaboration with interior designer Jill Danis, and playing off the owner’s quirky British humor (and love of sheep), I created bold graphics that would suit the playful nature of SmartDesign Group’s company culture. Each area had a distinctly different design style, helping to define designated spaces within the open concept studio.

The Springs Preserve is constructing a new Ethnobotanical Garden at their Visitor Center in Las Vegas. This project gave the design team at AldrichPears the opportunity to work with members of the Southern Paiute community to determine stories that highlight their rich culture and history, discuss native plants and their traditional uses, and share their visions for the future.

District Market was a bespoke news/gift concept that was developed for an RFP for San Francisco International Airport on behalf of client Marshall Retail Group. While at SmartDesign Group, I designed the branding and graphics for the space, drawing inspiration from the unique districts/neighborhoods within the city. The client went on to win the RFP bid with this design submission, and after completing build out, they opened the doors in 2017. This store has far surpassed all expectations, and become a dynamic news/gift space within the revamped SFO terminal.

Communicating clear and precise direction for signage fabrication is a vital part of the environmental design process at the construction phase. This stage involves collaborating with interior designers, project managers and food service designers to properly develop store signage details and convey design intent, sizing and placement to fabricators and installers.

A new xeriscape garden is currently being constructed at a large administration building in Boulder City, Nevada. These interpretive graphic panels will line walkways around the grounds to tell stories about the rich history of the city, educate the public about native plants in the area, and environmental efforts being done to preserve water, which is such a precious resource in the desert.

Some of my most favourite tasks as a designer involve creating custom illustrations and infographics, which when paired with interpretive content can help convey complex ideas in a more engaging and understandable way.

This is some of the working process involved in the graphic design for the Concept/Schematics phase for an environmental visitor center currently underway in California. Choosing color palette and typefaces, determining illustration and imagery style inspired by the local flora and fauna of the area, and beginning to layout sample interpretive panels. It was decided the content could be visually organized using iconography to designate topics, which would allow visitors to easily recognize themes and stories as they navigated through the building.

A new railroad museum is currently underway in Nevada. AldrichPears was tasked with the exhibit design, which highlights the unique history of rail transport and its impact on the transformation of Las Vegas, and its evolution into the future. This is a sample of some of the interpretive graphics that will be showcased there.

I have had the opportunity to work on a few signage and wayfinding projects over the past several years. I have created trail signage and interpretive maps for the Wanuskewin Heritage Park in Saskatchewan, the interior wayfinding signs and maps for The Manitoba Museum, and work is currently underway for a Parks Canada project in Ontario.

Over the past few years, I have been obsessed with botanical drawing. As an avid gardener, I love growing flowers and then photographing them for reference images. Coloured pencils have become my medium of choice, and I can easily lose myself for hours trying to capture the way the light reflects off water droplets, or details revealed in colour and shadow.  

One of my favorite things in the world is exploring cities and capturing images with my camera. I love the happenstance nature of street photography in particular, which forces me to slow down and notice the smaller details around me, which are constantly in flux.

Sometimes an idea for a personal project strikes you when you least expect it. Who knows where they come from? They just arrive, uninvited.

[One day, a random thought] I wonder why anthropomorphic foods/animals are always happy? Shouldn’t they be more angry/disgruntled?

That one fleeting idea turned into the Bittersweets, a business built around these weird little handmade creatures; something to help pass the time between art school classes. Over a few years, I designed & sewed hundreds of them, first just for friends, then eventually to sell online and at craft shows. Custom orders were a challenge I relished, delighted at the opportunity to take someone else’s interesting idea from sketch to final product.

Creating memorable brands helps set the tone for overall customer experience and is the front-facing identity that draws visitors in.

Several of the bespoke brands I designed for SmartDesign Group went from the initial RFP stage to build-out, and can be found in airports around the world.

I have long been a lover of books. Both of my grad projects involved publication design. After graduating from Emily Carr, I had the opportunity to work at Whitecap Books. There I was able to design several complete books including Travel Best Bests, The Canadian Hiker’s & Backpackers Handbook, and 500 Best Value Wines in the LCBO.

Here are a few examples of older work that I’ve done. This includes a corporate eyewear brand that I developed at Suntech Optics, and a (hypothetical) sample e-newsletter I designed for a Fluevog interview.