How It Began

OUR STORY

In March of 2012, I traveled to Seattle for a journalism conference to speak to college students about editorial design.

On our last night in the city, my group was craving Italian food. While I didn’t quite understand this urge over the region’s known amazing seafood, I carried along. After a quick search online for something moderately priced and moderately close, we embarked into freezing temperatures before stopping in front of the restaurant. Displayed in the window was an oversized and overly embellished logo full of illustrative swirls and flourishes that instantly read as expensive. With a little hesitation, the group continued inside where a trendy waiter greeted and escorted us to our seats.

After ordering a water, I opened up my leather backed menu and was equally delighted and shocked to find both low prices and an all-day breakfast menu. Somehow this place had an unadvertised alter-ego none of us expected and I quickly felt the “authentic” Italian experience I imagined subsiding. As I began to look around the restaurant I couldn’t mentally connect the marketing to the logo, the menu, or even the decor. And then a piece from my presentation earlier that day resonated with me: to effectively explain design, one must be cohesive and consistent. Not only was I subconsciously confused in the space, but the lack of design harmony left me feeling unsettled. In that moment, I thought, had one design company handled everything for this small business, the vision may have been clear.

When I returned from the trip, my head was buzzing with ideas of how to develop a firm that handled it all and did it seamlessly. After countless pots of coffee, hours of developmental research, and the encouragement of others, Dash Creative Group was launched.

– Mike Trobiano, founder