a star is born

The Oliver appetizer plates came from an idea to create a quirky, hand illustrated design that “interacted” with photo-realistic objects—a big graphics trend.

Knowing that the design would go on our cuatro plates, we brainstormed about objects that one might have on an appetizer plate at a party. Crumbs, toothpicks, olives, crackers, and corks all came to mind, so we took some rough photos of them and started doodling.

What ended up sticking with everyone was “the guy with the teeth”. So next we chose our favorite appetizer bits—olives, corks and toothpicks—and shot a wide variety of each in our photo studio. We printed the photos onto drawing paper and mixed this 2-D “teeth” character playing with 3-D objects.

Going into this we felt very strongly about using actual pen and paper—no computers. Many different types of pens and papers were tested until the illustration quality was right. At this point, the character’s personality took shape and he was affectionately dubbed Oliver.

He’ll pick up whatever’s on your plate so keep an eye on him—and watch for more pieces to come!

Thanks to jana in graphic design who contributed and—more importantly—brought Oliver to life.

Comments

[Ron S]

Anyone know where I can purchase old Oliver Appetizer Plates for my wife??

[sandra]

The bad news is that the production run of each oliver plate is limited, so older versions are not available. The good news is that there's usually a new version to choose from--hope you like them Ron!