Further Up Co.

08/26/2026

Colors. What do they mean?

I really love these new Japanese Color Combination books given to me by a client yesterday. Amazing.

They have had me thinking about color in the roll of a brand.

I’m not sure I’m ready to discount color association theory wholesale, because associations as a whole in branding are a thing. It’s just that some of them matter and some of them don’t.

But above all a visual brand (logos, colors, fonts, design system) is a bucket to be filled with meaning.

We get to tell the audience a story about what these things mean to us, and what they should mean to them.

Strategically using color is all a part of the same goal.

Creating clarity and consistency over time.

To be clear, understood, and distinct.

05/15/2026

The last couple of years has had me slowly rebuilding and rethinking how I work.

Shifting from being a freelancer toward something that feels more like a studio.

More collaborative. More intentional. More ambitious.

I’ve been working on a new site that reflects that shift more clearly.

And more importantly it shows my ambitions for all of you. Your businesses, your goals, building your brands. Pushing things further.

I got into design 20+ years ago because I thought it was cool.

I stayed because I found it to be powerful.

Launching Monday. Can’t wait to share it with you all.

05/11/2026

Jumping on this LogoArchive trend.

About 2.5 years ago I ended a run of about 10 years of design leadership in-house at tech companies and went off on my own.

At the time I honestly hadn’t been doing a lot of branding or creating new work except for a freelance job here and there.

I assumed that in order to keep climbing higher in leadership I had to get further and further from the work. I didn’t love it but saw it as a trade-off for other really rewarding experiences.

Leadership, influence, education, and making a tangible difference in an organization.

I would often say to our teams that “your best work is ahead of you.” And I meant it. But I didn’t always believe that was true of me.

Putting these logos together from the last 2.5 years has been an exciting realization.

I am really proud of this work.

But I think all those years of organizational and leadership experience help me see these logos as more than logos and more than just "graphic design."

These marks represent real impact in organizations, real clarity gained, real goals achieved, and real brand power being leveraged.

I am launching a new site in the next week or so and it's exciting to see these stories coming together and the momentum really starting to build.

I've changed the phrase a bit these days because I see it play out client after client and project after project.

"Our best work is ahead of us."

05/04/2026

A good before and after can be very satisfying. It can also be really deceiving.

Because in the life of your business, it’s not just about a better logo. It’s about a better future.

It’s about who you are becoming, who you are for, and why it matters.

I started Further Up Co. because I wanted branding to matter. I wanted it to matter for the business and orgs I partner with and I wanted it to contribute to real business success, impact, and momentum.

All of the businesses in this collection got better logos. For sure.

But even more than that they got positioning and presence that matches what’s happening internally in their orgs.

And now they can tell the world about it.

04/26/2026

has been working with me all year on a couple of clients and took the lead on the Gala identity and collateral and it was great to see it come alive in the space.

04/26/2026

A bit of a sneak peak on what we’ve been up to with the branding this year. Swipe for the before and after. More to come soon, stay tuned!

04/26/2026

.ellis and i had the privilege of attending the Hope Has A Harbor Gala at The Lighthouse Mission last night to help support the incredible work the are doing of healing homelessness in our city. It was also great to see all the work I’ve been doing for the rebrand of the mission starting late last year to start to rollout including the logo behind us . more to come in a more detailed case study but very rewarding and enjoyable night.

04/26/2026