A Hobby Turned Profession

Most creatives will tell you their career started well before being accepted to art school. As a girl I was continuously in need of new pencil crayons, felts and paper. My specialty: fashion and lifestyle magazines for my stuffed toys. Those animals had it good. One day I was tagging along with my mom, who was running errands for work. We walked into a design firm, and I was pretty sure those people had the best job ever. The designer’s desk was lined with Pantone markers. He let my sister and I draw while we waited. The colors! The colors!!!

Some twenty years later, I’m still going strong. Although, these days it’s more Adobe Creative Suite than felt-tip markers. In 2005 I relocated from Edmonton, Canada to San Francisco, where you can still find me. Once I recovered from my painful Tim Hortons withdrawal, I came to find the Bay Area a pretty great scene and resolved to stay.

Website and User Experience Design

Let’s make the internet a fun place to visit. Your website should look great, be current, and be easy and fun to use. I’m always ready to collaborate with developers, internal stakeholders, and clients to create functional, inviting websites with elegant, human-centered interaction. I can assist with preliminary planning and concept development, user personas, use cases, wireframes, storyboards, navigation, mock-ups, design specifications, and everything in between. Have a look at some of my web design work.

Identity Development

Whether you’re big or small, I can help develop a company identity that defines what you do and who you are. From logo to print to web, I can work with you to define yourself in a way that speaks to your target market and sets a tone that unifies your entire marketing strategy. In the end, your business will have a cohesive, aesthetically sound and compelling brand. Take a look at some of my branding work.

Print Design

Move the message from the screen to paper (or any surface you’d like to print on). From design concept  to choosing a printer and paper stock, I can help generate the print materials your company needs. Mailers, conference materials, posters, stationery, marketing packages, or schwag—I can help. Take a look at some of my print work here.

Strategic Planning, Marketing, and Project Management

I’m not just another pretty…portfolio. Let me help keep your projects on scope, on budget, and on time. I’m a highly organized, focused, strategic professional with experience working within cross-functional teams to bring big projects to realization. A zen balance of creative skill and business savvy, I aspire to create work that is not only well designed, but satisfies the market it was intended for, meets the project parameters, and genuinely contributes to your business (or even the world!) as a whole.

—Elina Rubuliak