TrueLife - From Starbucks to Startups: The Award Winning, Passion-Driven Design of Yuri Shvets

Episode Date: December 23, 2023

One on One Video Call W/George https://tidycal.com/georgepmonty/60-minute-meetingSupport the show:https://www.paypal.me/Truelifepodcast?locale.x=en_US🚨🚨Curious about the future of psychedelics? Imagine if Alan Watts started a secret society with Ram Dass and Hunter S. Thompson… now open the door. Use Promocode TRUELIFE for Get 25% off monthly or 30% off the annual plan For the first yearhttps://www.district216.com/http://yurikacreative.com/Introducing Yuri, a seasoned brand architect with over 19 years of award-winning expertise in crafting distinct brand identities. Having honed his skills in prestigious Seattle agencies like Hornall Anderson and Lemley Design, Yuri has left an indelible mark by spearheading bold visions for industry giants like Starbucks, REI, and Tropicana. Since founding his consultancy in 2014, he continues to bring passion and quality to emerging brands across America and local PNW entrepreneurs. Yuri’s unique perspective emphasizes that remarkable brands thrive on shared vision, dedication, and direct access to company leaders, proving that extraordinary outcomes emerge when creativity meets possibility. One on One Video call W/George https://tidycal.com/georgepmonty/60-minute-meetingSupport the show:https://www.paypal.me/Truelifepodcast?locale.x=en_USCheck out our YouTube:https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLPzfOaFtA1hF8UhnuvOQnTgKcIYPI9Ni9&si=Jgg9ATGwzhzdmjkg

Darkness struck, a gut-punched theft, Sun ripped away, her health bereft. I roar at the void. This ain't just fate, a cosmic scam I spit my hate. The games rigged tight, shadows deal, blood on their hands, I'll never kneel. Yet in the rage, a crack ignites, occulted sparks cut through the nights. The scars my key, hermetic and stark. To see, to rise, I hunt in the dark, fumbling, fear. through ruins maze, lights my war cry, born from the blaze.

The poem is Angels with Rifles. The track, I Am Sorrow, I Am Lust by Codex Seraphini. Check out the entire song at the end of the cast. Okay, that one goes there. Okay, then I come over to this one and I hit the go live button, preview. Okay, and there we go. And I'm over here.

here. All right. Ladies and gentlemen, I hope that the world is treating you fair. That's how you can really hope for. I mean, I really hope the world's treating people wonderful. I hope that you are about to find a miracle in your stalking or you're waking up next to the person you love. I hope the sun is shining. The bird is singing. I have with me today a maestro of brand alchemy. An interesting individual, Yuri Schwetz, who's got a dazzling 19-year-old. symphony in Seattle's design realm, having choreographed brand ballets for giants like Starbucks, R-E-I, and Tropicana. Uri's portfolio reads like a hip parade of visual poetry, poetry, poetry, poetry.

From the stages of Cornell Anderson to the canvas of Lenley design, his artistic notes resonate with the rhythm of iconic brands. Yuri, thank you for being here, my friend. I hope you having a beautiful day. How's it going? All right, it's wonderful. Just hearing you say that, George, I want to, wow, if you want to imagine like if you were to put all that in poetry that you just

cited you know and you made made a 50 feet billboard out of that and put it at the new york square right in the middle of all this zoo wow how would that speak to people like i i i obviously you know i'm a little bit more humble than how you depicted me hopefully still you know but but but i do appreciate the poetry awards you know You said it in such a vivid fashion that it makes me want to know that you read that you just painted so beautifully. You know, I want to know about him more. Well, I think that that is the wonderful part of language and words and symbols and perspective and behavior. And that's, I think that's one thing probably of many that you do well is you have a really unique understanding of communication.

And that's one of the reasons I would love to talk to you today. Maybe give us a little bit of a background of how you came, who you were before I found you today, before you were the guy you were today. How did you get involved in all these things? Very interesting question. I think I would have to go all the way back to my childhood when I didn't want to go to kindergarten because my parents forced me to go for the reasons that. that I would be for all other things,

I would be drawing there. And I told them, guys, I'm not going because I hate drawing. Little did I know that drawing will become my kind of segue to the world of fine arts first and then design, you know, a few decades later, you know. So I guess I just naturally started doodling, maybe I don't know, first kind of first couple of weeks in the kindergarten, you know, maybe the hate dissipated too at the same time. I don't

know. And I never stopped doodling. I did stop drawing, meaning I haven't been an artist, what is it called, artist by trade, fine art, right? Because I have been that. I have been a painter before I became a designer. And I, my wife still hates me for Yuri. You haven't painted neither me nor our child or our beloved cat. And it's such a shame. And I go, honey, I love you. And I love all my family, including the cat. But I just don't paint anymore.

Not because the spark has evaporated. I just switched muses. And I switched them when I was in my early 20s. I got way more fascinated with the world of graphic design and a little later branding. And not that I lost any interest in fine art, I still go to galleries and museums, and I love listening to podcasts about great artists of all sorts.

But I don't feel the need to pick up a brush and do something with the brush of traditional tools. Obviously, since I'm in design, I do a lot of what's called creativity on demand, which involves all sorts of graphic output, right? You know, sometimes it's illustration that looks very traditional. Other times it would be something crazy future is back type of thing. And it's all, you know, creative and it's something that they expressed through,

through images and words, but it's not a traditional form of communication as it was for me, for my life prior to design. The first time I designed something without knowing that I'm designing is when, so I kind of grew up in a rough neighborhood and most of my, it was in the 80s, so when I was in my early teens, most of my friends were metal hats.

So they loved heavy metal and trash metal and speed metal. In all this siren maiden there and Megadess here. And I hated it. religiously. I was a little bit more like, you know, this, I don't know, now you'd probably call it metrosexual or something. I was in the new wave and, you know, aha, was my weapon of choice because it was melodic, beautiful and different. But these guys didn't necessarily bully me or hate me for being different. They thought, oh, this guy can draw. How about, you know,

you don't subscribe entire belief systems about all those amazing metal bands. But how about you paint this shit on our leather jackets? And you know, what we might even pay you? How about that? And I go, I don't know about that, but let me think. And so, you know, three days later, I'm painting all these horrific, you know, monsters trying to represent, you know, something like Iron Maiden on a, on some. cheap Turkish leather shirt on a guy who I don't know how he got this shirt and I mean the

jacket leather jacket and then I'm using oil paint trying to replicate the Iron Maiden logo that was the first logo obviously I didn't create I just tried to emulate it best they could right and then this horrible looking but amazing for them and Worcif admiration monster along with that logo. That was my informal entry into the world of branding, even though, I don't know, is it branding or is it trying to hope something who is very limited means and zero knowledge and also probably very little interest in the subject matter, right? But then, of course, you know, if you segue into the world of reality and so-called professionalism, you know, I did go to Cornish, which is a private school for

you know, art and design in Seattle. It's actually just celebrated over like 100 years, just very recently, I don't know, a few years ago. And I was privileged actually to study in their former building that they moved recently to downtown, but they used to be in Capitol Hill. And it was an amazing brick kind of, I don't know, very British-looking structure

was just, I think it was just four floors. And it was channeled after Bach House. So, you know, if you remember or if you know that Bauhaus, the whole system was about trying to fuse the different forms of art, right? So they didn't distinguish between fine arts, design, and other things. They felt that if you want to call yourself, you know, well-rounded, creative for men, you have to practice everything, right? So we commingled with fine artists, theater people, ballerinas, musicians, all in the same, you know, in this whole beehive called, you know, design school. And I love it. I still love it.

Not that it was, you know, it wasn't perfect, but I love it, right? So that experience of being exposed to different art forms and also trying to chisel kind of your way and what you can say with your tools. You know, that made me, I think, a better designer because I'm not just looking in. I'm very curious about other mediums, other disciplines, you know, be it philosophy, art, psychiatry, maybe a little less, even though I, you know. Well, no, I think psychiatry, too, you know, to a degree. But, like, subconsciously versus, like, studying something and taking curses or grasping knowledge. directly from, you know, folks like you, you know. So anyway, I can run on.

Like, ask me something. Yeah. No, it's important. I think it's, I think it's foundational to understand someone's mindset. Because what I hear is someone explaining the way in which they use language, be it theater, be it art, be it words, be it symbols. You're explaining to me how you communicate through graphic design. And I think that's the story that we're beginning to see.

And when I hear it, like, it's beautiful to me. I do see it as poetry. Like, wow, this is the first stanza. These are the first lines in which this masterpiece is coming together. And I think you have begun filling in these ideas about behavior, perspective, perception. And it must, for someone like yourself, if someone comes to you and it's like, here's my product or here's my service, like, what goes through your mind? Do you see that person's ideas? Do you see that person's dreams?

Do you try to put yourself in that person's perspective? Do you try to see what they're trying to get? Like, what is that relationship like when someone comes to you and is like, hey, can you help me design something? Like, what do you see in that person and in that product? What goes through your mind? Well, it's a very, it's actually deeply, it's more philosophical than people realize it being, at least for me. So there was this, I forgot his name. He's a public speaker.

And he said once, and it really spoke to me and kind of sunk pretty deeply into my psyche. So he said something along the lines, if you do not have soul injected and kind of infused into your venture, you will always be a product, but never a brand. And if you start deconstructing what it means, it goes pretty deep, right? So we all create something in the form of, you know, in the world of commerce. We all create something as an output, be it a physical product or a service. And there is a lot of us doing very similar things, whether we create, you know, new, I don't know, beverage or we come up with some, you know, I don't know, intellectual venture or things in the realm of like, you know,

be it virtual reality or artificial intellect and all that. But at the end of the day, most of the things that have been around, but people keep doing them, they're not that different from one another. You know, with an exception of AI being so new and yet already some people are getting tired of it because not all of this output is positive, although you cannot paint it as negative either. But that's still more or less novel thing. Most of the other commercial products, there's very few differences between them to begin with. And then even if they ever had differences. So, for example, take original iPhone and original everything before the iPhone came to being, right?

That was a revolution of thought before anything because iPhone suddenly created the need for something people didn't even think they have that need for, right? And it became not just a tool, it became an extension of people's hand. And then, you know, everybody kind of tagged the lawn and here we are. there is no, it's a point of no return. We cannot be without our devices. We feel like somebody cut your arm if you lost your phone for like freaking three hours, right? Yeah.

And it's unfortunate, but at the same time, it describes us as this kind of new community of 24-7 connected individuals or collectors and all that. But coming back to branding, when clients come to me, they come to me with products or services that are not exactly different from one another. But it's my job to tap into their inner selves, to uncover something that is still uniquely theirs, so that then I can bring it into the foreground and really give to the world something that is special and not fake, not something that's manufactured, not something that,

you know, like people in boiler rooms kind of conceive, you know, whether it's like marketing gurus or advertisers. I need to get deeply under the skin of each client to first A, almost get, almost like a kid, get fascinated by what they do. And then hopefully that curiosity and genuine kind of interest in what they do for the time being that we are connected and trying to grasp what it is that they do, then it's a lot easier for me to position them and make them appear really not just positive, not just, but unique and interesting in public eye.

Yeah. And that doesn't matter if, again, if the product or service is almost indistinguishable because people, as we know by now, do not just buy products because they are either novel or cool or different. There's that novelty factor that always will surround. around us and the company or actions. But beyond that, people buy into the ideas, right? They love certain things or products or services because people behind them, they get

attracted or otherwise. They either get attracted by them or turned off by them, right? I mean, the same thing. That's why, like, TASLA is so interesting is that at any given moment, Elon Musk can do something either outrageously positive and amazing for humanity, and then the next week can come up with something that will probably kill 30 or 40% of his vivid, you know, tribesmen who loved him just a week before, right? Even though there's some hard, hardcore fans who will probably to Mars with him no matter what he spits out on Twitter or X, whatever.

right but the point is we're driven by either singularity of something or someone who has this hold right and so he and people like him they have that's why we call them visionaries right they take us further sometimes we don't want to go there but they they are movers movers and shakers um to a certain extent right and the thing is is that of course like for me to love Tesla I kind of need to kind of a little bit fall in love with Elon Musk. And every time he hijacks the positivity from my perception, inadvertently, I started liking Tesla less, right? I mean, it should be not that related, right?

I mean, because after all, if he's putting out amazing product, for example, right? I mean, as a consumer, well, you should just appreciate it and forget about his private life or his, he's, you know, that's, I mean, his statements here and there and everywhere. But I cannot turn it off because I buy the entire, I buy him and the car and everything that comes next as kind of branches from that, you know, from that entity visionary of Elon Musk, whoever he, But I'm also willing to take him as what he represents, meaning that he's flawed, he's deeply flawed, and yet in some ways he's still an example for so many people. Because he is a leader and he's a pretty magnificent thing. He's just not amazing at everything, and people have to realize that.

But just because he's very bright in so many aspects, it doesn't make him God and it doesn't make him guru. But we still can learn a lot. So on a microscale, there was a long segue back to every client that they have regardless of their size and scope. You know, it could be a coffee shop next door with not a lot of money on the table. But if I get excited about like after talking, it was a founder, you know, of that coffee, how this coffee came about, why, and why should people care?

Once I start caring, it's a lot easier for me to carry this, I don't know, a sense of excitement or something that was revealed to me, then I give it the most appropriate and relevant visual form, if you will, with the hope that it will also attract others. That's what it really comes down to. From idea to physical embodiment of that idea through a graphic form and a specific form and abstraction, right, of that idea. So that's, sorry for the long answer. No, it's necessary. I love it. It's, I think it speaks to the idea of the soul and, you know, really getting in the, in the, in the, in the, in the, in the, in the, in the, in the, in the, in the,

the life of its own that it takes on. And it's contagious. It speaks to the idea of being contagious in this thing that people want to participate in. When I think, it's, of Tesla, I think of all the people that see themselves in a leader of sorts. Like, yeah, that's, I like this person's spirit of courage. I like this person's spirit of adventure. I do not like this person's spirit of authority or I do not like that. But everybody gets an opportunity to see themselves as Elon Musk when they look at him and when they drive his product or they, they get on his, his, his platform or something. Like they're participating in this contagious wonderfully or perhaps awful in both senses of the word dream you know what i mean it's cool to get

to participate in that on some level it's and i can understand how is it is it draining is it time consuming is it exhausting to try to put yourself in someone else's dream like that and then convey it to other people what kind of toll does it take on you to do that is it difficult is it fun is it hard is it easy um it's not necessarily hard it can be a little bit more exhausting if I don't know the subject matter well enough, right? So as a consumer, you know, it's a lot easier for me, for example, to design, let's say, something in the realm of, let's say, food and beverage, right? Because here I easily put on two hats.

I am a branding expert, but I'm also a guy who is either going to drink your liquor, or I'm going to hate it. I'm going to tell my friends that, uh-uh, don't go there, right? So you better have a good product to begin with, right? Yeah. So that's a lot easier because then your previous experiences help you and just you being there, you know, sharing this piece of earth with others. You know, you can gain a lot of knowledge just walking the earth.

However, with some other fields, especially in the realm of, let's say, you know, when I like a few years ago, I've branded. the company that was called, they actually, since then they changed the name. It was called Exxon VR. It was a time when VR was becoming a big new thing. And I had zero knowledge about VR and zero interest coincidentally, right? So of course, then it puts you a little bit more on your toes because, A, you have to do more research, have to dig a little deeper.

you can just rely on your intuitions, you know, previous knowledge. You really have to reveal yourself and to yourself that, wow, you know nothing about it. And you better, you know, have a little bit more grasp here before you can start making either intelligent or then graphic decisions on your client's behalf so that they're in true, right? So I wouldn't call it draining, but yet some projects, of course, take more from you just physically because of the amount of hours and sometimes days you need to spend on just research like trying to understand the nature of the beast if you will right but i i argue that if you don't do that because you know there's some designers that they choose certain

industries where let's just say they would swim more comfortably because it's either second nature Well, let's say, let's just say, if you are an avid outdoorsman, right, for you to design something for REI would be a second nature, right? You probably do it in your eyes closed, right? Well, yes, what? When I did REI, not only it's safe to save now because it's been many years. But what people don't know is that it was my very first branding project on this scale, right? Was I horrified? I think I was either too young or too stupid to be horrified because if I did, I probably just say, guys, I cannot do anything here.

You should teach me how to. But luckily, A, I had an amazing boss at the time, David Lamley, who also happened to be, you know, they had to have experience on me and years of experience. on me and he was in a way my mentor and there was only two of us at the time and two of us me and him we conceived that new rebrand manifestation of very like it was a you know Seattle's darling I mean yeah if you were to ask me before that I probably wouldn't even know that REI was headquartered in Seattle because I cared very little about campaign I hate to be in a tent I probably was in a tent maybe two twice in my life both times I regret it.

I'm a through and through city child. But guess what? When you put in that position when you know a little about that world and then you just start exploring various rabbit holes to get your way in, you start enjoying the ride in the process because what I never lacked is the curiosity. You know, because I am led by curiosity since the change. childhood, that's what keeps me on my toss because I never proclaimed to be an expert in everything. And then there's that desire to always learn something new that then benefits

either particular project or particular client or particular graphic output because I can look at the world from different perspectives. Sometimes, interestingly enough, I need that external force, meaning in that sense, it's a client, right? So guess what? after I've gone through REI brand, I've learned a great deal that I could then speak as an avid outdoorsman. I would understand the language, the gear, what they go through and all that, because I learned a lot just by doing and experiencing certain things. And so I think those external forces and triggers are very important.

So designers who, for example, only choose something that's comfortable. Right. Like some designers will be just designing, let's say, in the food and beverage department because guess what? Every designer on Earth would love to work in that world. Like, you know, whether you're designing your next, I don't know, cold press juice or you're designing your next, I don't know, gear for a sport company or something. You know, like these are givens. These are fun things to do. But if you're just limiting yourself to what's convenient and what and known, there's just not that much room to grow. And after a while, you'll start getting stale, fat and comfortable, and you'll start losing the edge. And so I actually love the fact that I get to work on virtual reality assignment one week or months and then move and work on something entirely different for like white color type of assignment here and in very blue color where I have to understand that person who works with their hands, the craftsman, who I don't get to hang out on daily basis, I get to be either their friend or confident or learning from that type of individual, it also benefits me

even beyond the job, you know? So that's what I think fascinating about my field, because it kind of, I guess it makes me a little bit of a chameleon, but in a negative way. Like, I absorb all the learnings and insights from every client I get to interact with, no matter of how short. But again, it's not that short. I mean, my typical project takes at least, I want to say, a month, right? So that's full immersion. Sometimes it's so big, like when the scope is big and it's literally clocking in 40 hours

within that month, right? I almost forget that the world outside exists. I mean, some people can call it flow. Other people can say, Yuri, did you forget it? You also happen to be a father, a husband, and you feed the cat. Yes, there is some negative aspects of that too when you completely lose your mind and go too deep. But the beauty of it, though, is that that level of full immersion is kind of rare. So when you get to that truth that you're digging into, it shows in your output.

Because if you sidestep or shortchange the process and get less hours in the research or just trying to understand that, like, you know, how many ways you can skin that get, then you end up with very convoluted solutions because then you just essentially end up repeating the same formulas, right? And I try to avoid that as much as possible as a designer. Sometimes it's unavoidable because certain solutions they're already in your head and they're popping first. That's why I always tell younger designers, guys, the first solutions for the most part you come up with is 99%. This will be trashed because it's cliches that overpopulate our brain and we just access something that's, A, either

already we already know about, heard somewhere, saw somewhere, Google before and forgot. And that's why for the most part, it will be junk. And you need to still put it on paper and play with it. And then maybe you'll get to something. But don't believe for a second that just because you spent half an hour on a job, yes, there's some, there's exceptions to the rule. I've known some legendary designers who would doodle something on a napkin during the corporate meeting and that little doodle become a multi-billion dollar brand.

That happens, but not very often. Yeah, it's, thank you. It's fascinating to see the level at which true design comes to life. And it speaks to the idea of growth. It speaks to the idea of storytelling. It speaks to the idea of the unknown. Like how can you convey what someone's dream is or someone's idea is in an hour? Like you can't.

Like you have to live that life. Like you have to put on that skin. You have to thoroughly understand what that product or that design or that service can mean. You have to imagine what it can mean if you want other people to fall in love with it. It's, you know, as a brand architect, how do you approach the philosophical, aspect of persuasion through language. How does language become a powerful tool in influencing consumer behavior? Wow, that's a tough one.

I know. Well, interestingly enough, I probably, to a degree, a wrong person to ask this question for two reasons. A, English is my second language, right? So that's one, very important aspect of why I'm not the right person. Second, as a designer, I am viewing my narrative predominantly through images and a little less source rewards, although sometimes it's either, it's not interchangeable, but it is interconnected. So oftentimes in my designs, I will employ copy in a form of headlines or some statements or something, even though I don't actively or, or officially promote that because I will oftentimes tell my clients, guys, you're not hiring me

for those type of things. For this, for example, if you want somebody to write you an amazing mission statement, that has to be a brand strategist and a copywriter, some amazing board slinger who will put your, in other words, they will have to understand what it is underneath you that drives you and makes you tick, and then they will use their own magic to put it so that it becomes poetry, right? I can do that, but that will not be a natural thing for me to do, because this is not what I went to school for, but because I'm a thinking, man, I sometimes do that.

I just don't advertise that so that I'm never held accountable because I say, you know, for this, yes, rest assured, you probably want to involve, you know, excellent. experts in language, right? Right. So I'm not shy to put words along my images. It's just like I said, because, well, ironically, I also believe in the power of images in that proverbial sense that an image is worth a thousand words, right? In that sense, like, how do you create something where people can look at something and then have so many readings just by looking at your graphic visual output

where there's only like one or two photos or illustrations and one or two words and yet it paints a whole new world for them. If it's, I don't know, if it's just surface level and if it's just pretty and cool, it will fall short and you will fall short and you will fall. fall flat on your sword, you know, very soon. It has to have some depth, right? So I, you know, I go deeply into each project so that I can uncover that essence behind each client and a project. And words play a great deal. I'm motivated probably more by images first and then words naturally find kind of its way into it. But sometimes, you're just, I'm motivated, probably more by images first. And then words naturally find

kind of its way into it. But sometimes I do take on a different hat. It does happen where I would say, enough with doodling, let me just pretend I'm a writer. And when I put on that head, I'm almost like a method actor. And I try to, you know, express the meaning of something,

through words first, and then I would redeploy them and see how they, you know, jive with images and vice versa. So it's never like it's never literal. It's not a literal process. But it is fun. And like I said, I just, I wish, you know, because I always, I'm always fascinated with

those amazing, you know, like a regional, like a traditionally well-known ad man who would create this amazing three-word headline that you just, you know, you just read it and it's it's nothing but poetry right like then you don't even care whether people will will buy this product or not you just go wow how can somebody can put two or three words together and then it's it's something indescribable because again there is depth that then sublimates into something succinctly short and concise but to get to that simplicity somebody has to be very, very well-read and very complex. And people gravitate to that, right?

Right. Well, do you see images as symbols? For you, what is the relationship between imagery and symbolism? Well, since, so I specialize in brand identity design. That's my forte. That's also my calling, I believe. Yeah. I love, well, first of all, from all the aspects and all the categories within the

graphic, within the field of graphic design, right? Branding and brand identity is something that I call innately belonging to my calling, so to speak, more than other disciplines. because it's a little bit more, what's the word I'm looking for, evergreen. Because majority of graphic design is ephemeral. Is that a word? Yeah. What it means is that if it's advertising, it's seasonal, right?

So people move from like, you know, winter holidays theme to a spring, whatever. right and so it's supposed to change all the time and kind of sync up with people's moods of the day of the months of the year all that stuff right and it's fun and games but it has a very short you know shelf life right and so as a result it interests it interests me a little less because i still want maybe that fine artist that hasn't completely died inside me yeah he won want something of more formidable and more of a substance, right? So if you think of logos, right? That's what I do pretty much.

Most of my waking hours are focused around designing brand identities and logos. Logos are those symbols that's supposed to embody the meaning and essence behind each brand in a most simplified and almost rudimentary but not quite fashion that sometimes should be unilaterally understood and sometimes even without you speaking the language. So almost like if you can't even read Japanese, but the symbol you somehow will react to. And if it's done well,

you will unavoidably have a positive, positive reaction to the symbol and then it will potentially will make you want to find out what this brand about what they're selling blah blah blah so i do i work in the realm of symbols because at the end of a day these are the signs that represent bigger ideas but they have to be packaged in this seemingly simplified form and just like with headlines that you know it's a lot harder to achieve this three-liner that, you know, bevilders you, well, logos are also a lot harder to actually do than many people assume, you know? So as a result, by the way, I'm not the most cost-effective designer because I actually try to create value, not just some cool thing that then, you know,

just sit somewhere in the left, upper left corner of your website. I don't do dim but, It's not your website. I'm saying, in general. At the end of a day, some people may say, oh, why am I supposed to pay? It's just this little thing, right? No, it's a sign of it's something that represents you. It's better be good then, right? Because if it sends a wrong impression, well, then you're going to lose.

Like, God knows how many percentage of your buying audience. So it better be good. So that's why I'm trying my hardest to do something that, makes meaning and then potentially communicates, can communicate this meaning to a larger audience that then helps to see this product or service, not in a cheesy, phony, superficial, artificial light, but it's bringing something of essence to them,

which otherwise they wouldn't be able to grasp for no more care. Right? So that's easier said than done in my book, you know? Yeah, I think in everybody's book, it's important to understand the value that underlies images and the relationship it has to the way we think and the way we communicate. I find images and symbols fascinating. You know, when you start looking at each letter can be looked at as a symbol or an image. And that's an interesting concept, too, when you think about, at least in the English language, we teach kids the letter,

and then they teach them a word, and then they teach them a sentence, and then they teach them a paragraph, and then they teach them a book and then they teach them like a series of books but they teach this linear way of thinking language on some level teaches people to think like this instead of this exponential way of like take this idea and then move this one over here instead of creating this imaginative world where anything is possible or taught just to stay in this lane and and focus down that road but I'm kind of birdwalking here do you believe there are universal images that transcend cultural differences? I believe so, yes. There's not that many of them because that's why we've been pretty much redeploying because there's something called collective knowledge, right? Right.

Because at the end of a day, if you go all the way to something like pyramids of Giza, right, what you see, you know, scribed in those and engraved in stone is essentially logos and symbol. right i mean they're what are they called petroglyphs or something there's certain things you know the eye says vision and that came from that guy looking into the stars whatever the gods and all this we are driven by you know mythology and ancient civilizations all these things that no longer

exist but gave that gave gave us some initial graphic forms right yeah i mean the power like for example, what's interesting is that sometimes, of course, it has a negative effect. So, for example, as you may know, swastika was not always a negative symbol, right? Right. But Hitler hijacked it, stole the original meaning. I don't remember whether there was some Indian, it was one of those. Right. So now, a few generations later, of course, some generations already done.

never even knowing, never knew, being able to even know, grasp that swastika was not always negative. But it's such a powerful symbol that it's, I don't know how many generations or lightening years on Earths, whatever we will take before somebody will be able to shake off surrey from it and then give it back to the world for what it meant to begin with. And I don't remember what it meant, but it's, clearly didn't mean annihilate as many people of certain type and all that. Right. And so, but that also communicates ironically the power of branding. Because, you know, people can talk about Nazis, but they cannot talk about Nazis without in some ways almost admiring the beauty of their uniforms of the design, of the entire design of Sir Drive was an amazing,

one of the first bevildering corporate identities ever made, right? And so what can be learned from that? How you can communicate with so little. Like, you know, they use color red, by the way, Coca-Cola also if he uses color white. You know, and then they're, you know, and so there's like very minimal forms and that one symbol that I, every time I look at the symbol, it gives me shivers. because it's loaded with so much information. And of course, all of it is so profoundly horrific and negative that it's hard to divorce just a simple four lines, you know,

crisp or something. Right. That's your logo at its most profoundly effective and profoundly horrific at the same time. But if you bring it back to like positives, that's why people gravitate to the most. I'm scared to use the word simplicity because it's not the right word to describe it. At the end of a day, when you look at Nike's and apples of this world,

they are extremely boiled down obstructions, right? And so, and you know, along with golden arches of McDonald's, right? Like what does that have to do with burgers, right? Well, yeah, but these are like actually French fries made into the letter M or like golden arches. Well, that's not how people think, though. They just, you know, right? It's subconsciously, you just connected to it because McDonald's have been around for like not that much shorter than Egyptian pyramids, at least for America. You know, history, you know.

And so in that regard, it's ingrained in your psyche. And you don't deconstruct it. You just take it for what it is. And it's a powerful visual symbol that quite frankly, at this point, doesn't even need the word McDonald's next to it, right? I mean, you just, you look at those arches. And you either are going to say, well, I'm craving a Gucci burger or steer clear from those guys because you know what they're selling, right?

That's a powerful, in other words, little simple forms communicate a great deal of complexity because you always layer on collective knowledge and politics and specific way of being in a particular country. But the global brands have to transcend that because they have to suddenly communicate concepts that used to be local to a much, much wider audience. That's why I think it's a lot harder to design for global clients. And, you know, Trappicana, for example, was when we had to work on like all four continents, you know,

and tested, you know, products with so many different types of people who appreciate different things, believe in different things, attracted to different things. It is a lot harder. But at the end of a day, we're all human. We have very, quite a big number of shared beliefs that makes us very relatable. That's what we need to grasp. That's what makes certain things more transcendent than others is that when we connect to the common humanity and then add a few flavors that make individual

tribe different from another, it becomes a lot more effective, right? But that again, that means more research, more trying to grasp what makes us. different and what makes us similar, right? Yeah, it reminds me of embroidery a little bit. Like on one side, you have this beautiful image. But if you turn it back around, there's all these little shortcuts and stuff hanging out and like, you know, yeah, totally. It's almost like roots, right? Like, like it's all messy. And maybe that's an interesting way to describe. That's very, it's a beautiful, again, very poetic of you, right? So people hardly ever look at that because they, ages, you know, well, it's a mess.

What is there in a way kind of almost describes this, I don't know, messy nonlinear world of creation that there is something that is very intertwined, if you will, and not always polished, beautiful and succinct, but then what you see, then it has become or given that precise, boil down beautiful graphic form, right? that then becomes this little shiny object that so many people gravitate to, right, or proud to wear on their sleeves, right? Yeah. Yeah, it's fascinating to think about all the work that goes into that.

And no one, most people get to see the polished product, or I like the way you say to put that badge on and be proud of it, but maybe what really people are doing is they are proud of all the work that went into it. And you start looking at the messaging, you know, when the true message of that patch comes through, it's like, wow, that's what it means. And maybe that's where the power comes from from all those images. No, no, absolutely. And, you know, I want to add, George, that oftentimes when, you know,

so when clients come to me or any designer for that matter, the prerogative is to get the brand going and become more attractive to the audience. that's like given and that's something that obviously that's primarily what I'm paid to do. But I oftentimes have to remind them that branding is not just outward-facing mechanism to get you more, you know, more buying audience and to get you stand out more from your rivals. It's also inward-facing because the logo that I'm creating, it better look good on your workforce, whether they're wearing this hat, you know, in a corporate meeting or a picnic with friends where they don't have to exemplify you anymore. So guess what? If your logo sucks, they're not

going to put that t-shirt on or that hat on because suddenly they are allowing themselves to divorce themselves from the brand that they have to represent from 9 to 5. And guess what? If your brand is sound, beautiful, and communicate something beyond the obvious, they will wear that in less than formal settings and they will continue to promote this brand forward because that's the testament of how much they as individuals actually believe in you as a visionary, if you're a founder, and then how much they carry that brand on their sleeves when they don't have to or nobody prescribes them to, right? Yeah.

People don't think about it that way, but it's just as important. Yeah. Yeah, I love it. You know what happens to me when I speak to incredibly fascinating and just people that think outside the box and that I really resonate with and I'm really proud to talk to? You happen to me is my time flies like by like that. And just like that, we're like at an hour. And I have like...

Really? Yeah. I know. I know. And I normally have longer time set aside. my wife needs to use the workstation down here. I love it, man. I hope you'll come back and I hope we can have more discussions

because I think we just barely scratched the surface of so much cool ways in which people can identify things they want to do and the meaning behind what you're doing, man. But before I let you go, where can people find you? What do you have coming up and what are you excited about? So, well, my website is uricocreative.com, spelled in a weird way because it starts with my name. So it's Y-U-R-I, right, K-A-Creative.com, not E-U-R-A-E-K-A, but it has the same origins, right?

That's like a little bit of a double entangra there. Love it. So you can always find me there. But I'm actually more than anything. I'm very active on LinkedIn. So, yeah, please follow me, find me. I try to put a post a week. It's not always possible.

but at least I strive to be, you know, proactive on LinkedIn. I love it. You know, it's a great audience, very rewarding. And so we'll see what will come. There's a few interesting things that I'm interested in, but as, you know, we never say about, right, a fisherman never counts the case until it's done. So thank you for asking that, though.

Yeah. Ladies and gentlemen, go down to the show notes and check out the links. And what you got to see today was merely a glimpse, a strand in the tapestry of the artwork that Erie puts into his work. And I hope you'll go down, you'll check everything out. I hope you got to see a quick glance of who he is and why he's so passionate and why the work that he does exutes that passion. Go and check it all out. You'll see what I'm talking about. There's the fine art.

There's the whole embroidery factor of it. But that's all we got for today. You're hanging on briefly afterwards. Ladies and gentlemen, I hope you have a fantastic. day that's all we got and i'll talk to everybody soon aloha thank you so much george thank you for having me it's been it's been fun