If you haven’t seen them play yet, then you need to come to this. If you have, then you know why you need to come to this. I will see you there.

I have enjoyed Switchfoot’s music for years and had the opportunity to begin working with them last fall. I also had the pleasure to design and produce merchandise for them on there tour with Athlete that just finished up. They recently release a new video for the song that will in the new Chronicles of Narnia movie, Prince Caspian. The video and song are both great. I can not wait till this movie comes out.

Last Friday, I went out to lunch with a few friends and learned about a new (well, being that I am a little late on this trend, newer) coffee shop in town. Being as though coffee plays a major role in my daily diet, I was more than intrigued. Unfortunately, I had to get back to work and was not able to join them on Friday afternoon when they went. Later that evening, I was on the bus with one of my clients, Relient K, and overheard both Travis and Derek, members of the crew, raving about the same place. We returned from the show in Greenville on Sunday morning and I had to check out this place on the way to lunch. Unfortunately, they were closed and a visit to this coffee shop alluded me once again.

When I first began LaCroix Design Company and LaCroix Merchandising, I had big ideas about what working for myself would be like. One of those included me taking my laptop to various locations to spend time working on projects there. However, over the past couple of years, those out of office excursions have dwindled. I now find leaving the office to be a bit of an inconvenience. My workload has increase quite a bit over the last two and half years and in that time, I have made it a priority to to equip my workspace to be everything that I would need. Not only do I have all my supplies and reference materials here but I have also created it to be an aesthetically pleasing place to work. Additionally, to fuel my constant coffee craving, I subscribe to Intelligentsia’s Roaster’s Choice plan which provides me with three pounds of great coffee every month. On top of that, I have a wonderful girlfriend who works at Starbucks and regularly brings me tasty beverages home.

With all the talk of this new coffee shop’s grandeur on my mind, I decided to get out of the office and take a little field trip today. I have been a little cooped up in here with a heavy workload and am working on a project which required a number of hand drawn typefaces and illustrations. Therefore, I packed up my sketchbook, ipod and some drawing tools and headed over to Crema Coffee. Upon Derek’s advice, I ordered myself a double Cuban Coffee and grabbed a seat at the bar facing the window. The drink was phenomenal and I do not recall ever having a coffee drink taste so good. Additionally, the place had a great vibe to it. I spent about and hour or so there working on some rough sketches and it was a great place to get away for a bit. I eventually had to head out for fear that I would be there reordering Cuban Coffees all day.

I am now highly recommending Crema to anyone who will listen. It will definitely be a more excursion in my work day. In fact, there is a good chance that I will be back in there before the week is over. If you are here in Nashville, definitely go check it out and let me know what you think.

CREMA

Hours: 7:00 AM to 7:00 PM Mon - Fri &

7:30 AM to 3:00 PM on Saturdays

Address: 15 Hermitage Avenue,

Nashville, TN 37210

Well, its the last day of the March and this month has been crazy busy. Relient K started up with their first run of shows for the year. Ethan Luck is now playing drums for them and the new lineup sounds great. Additionally, Switchfoot and Midnight To Twelve have both started up with their individual tours. I have some shirts that I have designed and printed out with those bands as well.

I have had the chance to travel a bit with work this month. I’ve spent some time in New York City, Washington DC, Philadelphia and back up to New York. It has been a blast getting out of the office for a bit but now I am back in town for a while and happy to be focusing on design again.

I am looking forward to wrapping up some design projects that I have started for Kyle Vanden Bosch (Tennessee Titans), Bullitt Menswear, Midnight To Twelve, 12th and Porter and Relient K. I will get the work posted as it is approved. Until then, I’ll be at the office drawing, mouse clicking and listening to MGMT.

“Oracular Spectacular” (MGMT)

I may be a little late on this but just stumbled across it.