Friendly Arctic Printing & Design Blog

Porter Flea

2011-07-06T11:48:00.000-07:00

Join us this weekend at the first ever Porter Flea! It's going to be an awesome day of local art and crafts, fine food courtesy of the best food trucks in town and great music thanks to former WRVU superstar, DJ Susan. We're going to be out at the event all day selling shirts and printing a limited run of East Nashville posters.

Visit www.porterflea.com for more info

New Olive & Sinclair Shirts!

2011-05-04T10:33:00.000-07:00

Check out the new Olive & Sinclair shirts we made this week. Not only does O&S make some of the best Chocolate anywhere but their bars come in some of the most amazingly designed wrappings I've seen in my life. It was quite a daunting task designing for a company with such a stylish reputation but I think we did justice to the O&S look. You can pick one of these beauties up at www.oliveandsinclair.com for $14.50...It's hard to beat that!

Earth Day 2011!

2011-04-22T08:57:00.000-07:00

We've been working like mad men this last week printing and designing all of this year's merch for the 10th annual Nashville Earth Day Festival in Centennial park tomorrow....We'll have a booth at the festival where we will be selling our FA brand shirts and telling the masses about better methods of printing, if you're in Nashville tomorrow you should stop by the festival and say hello!

2011-02-18T14:49:00.000-08:00

Check out the action shots our new friends at Landscape Solutions took when they were in the shop yesterday doing their press check...These shirts are looking pretty good...And speaking of looking good, if your in the market for some landscaping this work this summer you should give Jeffrey and Cliff a call and let them turn your boring old garden into a thing of beauty! Check them out at www.landscapetn.com

Web Store Launch

2010-12-15T12:59:00.000-08:00

Starting today and moving into the future we are launching a brand new web store where you can go to buy shirts from our clothing line. We came across a new social ecommerce platform recently called Storenvy and decided that we finally found the perfect outlet to launch our shop. You can visit our store at http://friendlyarctic.storenvy.com/

Happy Shopping!

Friendly Arctic Holiday Market

2010-11-10T11:33:00.000-08:00

If you're looking for a unique gift for that special someone in your life for these forthcoming holidays, be sure to stop by and browse through our winter wonderland of merchandise. Each Friday and Saturday in December before Christmas, Friendly Arctic will be hosting a holiday market of local, handmade clothes, prints and gifts. We will have gifts and products from our friends at Cool People Care, Owlette Collective, Pine Street Makery as well as a special selection of our own Friendly Arctic Designs.

Live On the Green

2010-09-16T12:10:00.000-07:00

For the next 5 Thursdays including tonight we will be out at Live on the Green in Public Square park selling our clothing line. We've been busy over the last few months putting together all of the graphic design for the festival and LOTG website so we're super excited that the event is finally here. The festival goes from 6:00 - 10:30 every week and tonight one of our Favorite bands, Dr. Dog will be playing...It's going to be a beautiful night so come on out and enjoy the fresh air and great music, and while you're at it stop by and buy a T-shirt.

For more information about the festival or to check out more of our design work visit www.liveonthegreen.net

-A

Gunner's Glass Recycling

2010-09-06T06:23:00.000-07:00

We really do have the best customers in the world! A few weeks ago we designed and printed some shirts for East Nashville's own Gunner Sweeney A.K.A Gunner's Glass Recycling. For those of you who are unfamiliar with Gunner he is a 6 year old who, with the help of his dad, started a glass recycling service due to the fact that Metro Nashville curb side recycling doesn't collect glass.

So if you live here in East Nashville and don't know what to do with all that pesky glass that is piling up in the basement or making you feel like a bad person every time you toss it in the trash, just give this young man a call and he will fix you right up!

For more information about Gunner's service or to buy one of these shirts you can go to gunnersrecycling.com

Cool People Care about our friends to the south.

2010-07-26T11:00:00.000-07:00

After the huge success of the We Are Nashville shirts this summer, the boys at Cool People Care have put together two new designs to help our friends in the gulf states effected by the massive oil spill. The proceeds from the Spill Love Not Oil design will go to Shareholder's Alliance, a nonprofit organization promoting sustainable fishing in the Gulf and beyond. The proceeds from the Pelican design will be going to NWF's Gulf Coast Restoration Fund .

Do your part to help the gulf recover by buying one of these hot new shirts!

Inconvenient Youth!

2010-07-06T15:26:00.000-07:00

I almost can't believe it's been almost 2 months since I've posted a new blog entry...It's been crazy to say the least. Most of May was spent frantically printing as many We Are Nashville shirts as we could. It seems like things are starting to settle down with that project which has been a nice change of pace...

We recently printed a run of shirts for Al Gore's youth program, Inconvenient Youth and I am really happy with the way they turned out.

More to come soon...

-A

We Are Nashville Shirts

2010-05-07T07:09:00.000-07:00

Guess who printed that?...You guessed it...Friendly Arctic Printing & Design

This shirt is blowing up online and raising thousands of dollars for victims of last weekends massive flooding in Nashville. If you want to get one of these nice shirts for yourself go to www.wearenashville.org . They're $20 and all of the proceeds goes to help people in Nashville.

Whole Body + Olive & Sinclair

2010-04-26T21:15:00.000-07:00

Because of the craziness that is and was the Nashville Earth Day Festival I have fallen a bit behind on posting some of our more exciting jobs over the past month. We started off April by finally getting our clothing line into Whole Body in Green Hills (across the street from Whole Foods) and we couldn't be happier about it. We have been talking to the good people at Whole Foods/Body for almost a year now and for one reason or another we never seemed to make any real progress until finally, in March everything fell into place...So if you're in the Nashville area stop by and pick up a shirt for yourself. They are 100% organic cotton, grown and manufactured in our United States for just $26.00. It's hard to beat that!

In addition to our FA shirts being available in Whole Body, we have also done some printing for Nashville's finest bean to bar chocolate company, Olive and Sinclair, who's new shirts you will find nestled sweetly next to ours at WB. Their factory is just down the street from our house in East Nashville and they are producing some of the best chocolate my mouth has ever tasted...Seriously...I don't really like chocolate that much and I love it...So if you happen to be in at the Green Hills Whole Foods stop by and pick up some of our freshly printed merchandise as well as a bar of that delicious chocolate...You will not regret it...

-A

EARTH DAY!!!!!

2010-04-14T12:54:00.000-07:00

That's right...This Saturday, April 17th 2010 at Centennial Park is Nashville's 9th Annual Earth Day festival. We've been working hard to print the two different T-shirts, tote bags and posters which will be for sale at the festival. It's going to be a great day so if you're in the Nashville area you should come out to Centennial Park and say hello to us at our Friendly Arctic booth...

April Shirt of the month

2010-04-01T10:20:00.000-07:00

With the coming of spring we decided that it was time to launch a new idea. With every new month we are going to be offering up a new design, printed on super soft, American made, organic cotton shirts for you to get your hands on. The plan is to pre-sell the shirts In April and print them and ship them out once all of the orders are in at the end of the month. And, as if that weren't enough, we have decided that we just can't keep this idea all to ourselves. We are looking for artists, designers and doodlers of all kinds to join us...So if you have an idea for a great shirt let us know about it and maybe you too can win a spot in our Shirt of the Month project.

-A

Serendipity

2010-03-11T12:24:00.000-08:00

I just finished up a few coin purses for Julie at Serendipity on 12th Ave. South here in Nashville and they are pretty great looking. Julie was actually our first customer ever and although we mostly do random custom work for her - which by the way is not something we offer anymore...sorry! - It's always fun doing such challenging and creative work. So if you are into vintage purses you really need to stop by Serendipity and see what she has in stock. We're always doing new ones so if you don't like the latest one just wait a month or so and she will probably have something new.

-A

Daniel Ellsworth

2010-03-02T07:58:00.000-08:00

It's not everyday that you see a deer wearing a top hat but very soon that could all change. We just finished up a run of shirts for the Nashville band Daniel Ellsworth & The Great Lakes which features a lovely deer sporting a fetching top hat. I'm not sure how we consistently get such awesome customers but somehow it just keeps happening. You should check them out on Myspace to listen to their songs and when you inevitably fall in love with their music you should go see them live and buy one of these great shirts so that you too can make top hat wearing deer a daily occurrence.

-A

No Way Jose!

2010-02-16T14:46:00.000-08:00

I just finished up a run of 12'' sleeves for some friends who are starting a new record label called Fork and Spoon Records and they are looking hot! Once everything is said and done these sleeves will be filled with beautiful colored vinyl, a set of crayons and a coloring book illustrated, like the cover, by Sam Spina of Spina Creative who has done a fantastic job of putting all the artwork together for this project. I can't wait to see and hear the final product!

Strike a Chord. Go Green.

2010-02-03T15:22:00.000-08:00

Yes, ladies and gentlemen! That's right! This is indeed your first look at the artwork for Nashville's 9th Annual Earth Day Festival which we designed in conjunction with White Thompson who is responsible for this years slogan. It was a great festival last year and we are honored to be a much bigger part of the festival this year...It's going to be a good day.

In addition to the artwork for the festival Friendly Arctic is going to be handling their website redesign, as well as the shirts and merchandise for the festival. I'll be sure to post more pictures once I have more to show.

-A

My Best Excuse.

2010-01-18T06:39:00.000-08:00

I want to thank our customers that I had to put on hold last week for being so understanding about our random shop closure but with the birth of our first son last Wednesday I feel like we had a pretty good excuse to take a few days off rather randomly. His name is Oliver James David Bird and so far he has been 6 pounds, 9 ounces and 20 long inches of pure joy and sweetness. We are now home from the hospital and with the start of the new week (1/18/10) we are open for business once again.

-A

Happy Holiday's

2009-12-22T07:48:00.000-08:00

We want to wish a very happy holiday season to all of our customers! We are so thankful for each and every one of you who has decided to bring your projects and ideas to us this year. We can't wait to work with all of you more in 2010!

It's been a crazy year to say the least, so in celebration of these upcoming holiday's we are going to close the shop this week and next in order to spend some time with our family. Hopefully after a good dose of sitting on the couch for long periods of time, cuddling up close to the ones we love the most while stuffing our mouths full of the seasons best baked goods, we will be all charged up and ready to go for the new year!

We hope all of you are warm and well this holiday season!

Love

Andy & Hadassah!

Utopia

2009-12-01T14:01:00.000-08:00

Earlier today I finished up a new logo and shirts for Utopia Coffee & Beer in Spring Hill, TN and I'm quite pleased with the outcome. I'm usually pretty proud of the work I do and I always do my best to come up with solid and stylish designs for all of our customers but for some reason this one was different. This one seemed more solid than normal. I'm glad that our new friends down in Spring Hill felt the same way. If your ever in Spring Hill and in need of a great cup of coffee you should stop by Utopia. You can see more information about the shop including directions at www.utopiacoffeehouse.com

More to come

-A

wedding!

2009-11-12T10:47:00.000-08:00

I designed and printed wedding invites for our friends Aaron and Jessica couple days ago and was very happy with them. I've been working up ways to print more paper projects and hopefully very soon we will have some posters and cards up on our etsy site, instead of the nothing that currently occupies that space. Lots more to come...

-A

D1

2009-10-20T06:39:00.000-07:00

The Past few weeks have been pretty busy for us in the shop. We've had so many deadlines that I was rushing to meet that I kept forgetting to take pictures of the jobs we were printing. One job that I was particularly proud of that we printed last week was for D1 which is a franchise of athletic training facilities around the country. I can't take credit for the design but I was proud of the detail we were able to get in the print. More to come...

Green, Green, Green

2009-09-03T11:37:00.001-07:00

Last Saturday we spent a good portion of the day at the Factory in Franklin for a green business and living summit put on by the folks at Keep Williamson Beautiful. It turned out to be an all around great day of meeting new people and getting the word out about water-based printing and responsible production methods.

The past few days have been spent working on shirts for the Live on the Green concert series in downtown Nashville. Every Thursday night from September 3rd through October 8th Lightning 100 is hosting a free concert in Public Square Plaza. So if your in Nashville go check it out and see all the shirts we printed for them. Although we didn't design these shirts we are pretty proud of the way they turned out, especially the five color left chest print on the white shirts.

More to come...

Welcome

2009-08-17T10:31:00.000-07:00

As this is the first official post on the new Friendly Arctic P&D blog I wanted to make sure we had a good project to present to kick things off...

Last week we finished up a batch of shirts for this years Shakespeare in the park festival complete with our very own retro design. For this shirt we really pulled out all the stops. In order to make the print look like a truly vintage design we did a three color smear print to get the color transition just right and to make each shirt completely unique. For those of you in Nashville you should really go check out this years' Shakespeare productions down at Centennial Park. Hadassah and I went the other night and saw the Taming of the Shrew and had a great time. For more info about Shakespeare in the park go to www.nashvilleshakes.org

More to come...