I am excited to introduce you to Germinate Creative. What was once maria g. design—my previous freelance venture—now has a new name, face, and mission. The website has finally been tilled and is ready to launch. Let’s get growing!

Why Germinate?
Germinate Creative is home to many things. I started Germinate to lead a successful design studio that cares deeply about the look and longevity of my clients’ promotions. I’m a one-stop graphic design shop offering multiple services, including branding, logo design, web design, and illustration. I thrive on creating work that is vibrant, yet right on the details.

Germinate will also be a space where I can share my inspiration, creativity, favorite yoga poses, delicious meals that I’m cooking, the coffee I’m brewing up this month, and more… not-work-life and design-life combined in a nourishing banquet.

My story
Before making a home in Portland I lived in beautiful, academic Boston. While there, my design experience varied from working in a small design studio, to designing at a big university. When I moved to Portland I chose the creative freedom and independence of freelancing.

The change was right for me. But it took persistence to get to “Oooh yeah, this is working!”  I hustled my portfolio around town. I began to brand and market Germinate Creative at night and on weekends while working day jobs. I constantly drew illustrations and took photos to keep myself creatively fresh. I tried different gigs to see what types of work I loved doing most. I attended a bunch of yoga classes. I drank a lot of coffee.

“OOH YEAH!” happened when I connected with clients who needed more than someone to bang out a job. Work began with people who valued strong creative, accountability, and business savvy. “OOH YEAH!” I got all that! As repeat clients started to depend on me I began to savor the warm, squishy feeling of good work.

At the same time I rekindled a passion for my own creative pursuits. Through the hustle and bustle of work, I realized my need to enrich myself creatively with personal projects that are meaningful to me and my audience. More about this beginning in February 2014!

Serving clients that are ready to grow
My clients have businesses with roots in the ground, regular customers, and steady bookings. But they haven’t yet invested in the fresh, high-quality web site, logo, and other collateral that speaks their story. Germinate helps them tie together hardy design with the clarity of brand their growing businesses need. On the blog I’ll be sharing case studies on how this gets done.

I know my clients need support in a myriad of ways. They may be a health clinic that commits to a better branded website and marketing materials. They may be a recycled shoe company that is relaunching their most popular product with new a new brand. Or maybe they are a local chocolatier that has grown out of it’s logo and website. Whatever the goal, Germinate Creative can help them with graphic design that is robust and authentic.

“Bloom where you are planted.”
I love what I do. I love long stretches of hard work, with every now and then a morning of coffee and watercolor. I’m perennially curious about what other people are interested in. I love a good laugh. I’m thrilled to be launching Germinate Creative.

By providing the creative expertise my clients need, and by keeping myself inspired, I believe that strong design can (as I say on my About page) change a life, serve a community, give the gift of joy, lead to success, engage an audience, provide pause, and create growth.