uzuri.

so for my senior project i had to create a business plan for a unique business or service. I decided to "start" an upscale eco-friendly women's boutique. i'm not going to spell out the entire one hundred pages of brilliance (come on, it's my blog. i'm allowed to say that) here, but if you really want to read it you can send me a message (ha, right). so to skip to the point i named the store Uzuri, which is the swahili word for beauty (which i realize makes no sense to you, but if you read the plan you'd get it). as a part of the one hundred million things we had to do to complete the senior project process, we were required to make/create an advertising specialty that reflected our business. advertising specialty is a fancy way of saying-- plaster your name on frisbees and t-shirts and coffee mugs, etc. think insurance company. we were required to actually create these and bring them in for submission to the teacher, not just draw a picture or write out a lengthy section detailing the plans.

since i decided to start an eco-friendly business i went with re-useable shopping bags. to jazz it up i added a booklet that had "10 easy tips for going green" and some tea. but the point of this explanation is i was quite proud of what i came up with as the end result. i worked on these with my grandma, we made five of them. i decided to really commit to the whole recycling thing and used fabric that had been originally used as a blanket....and then curtains... and then a table cloth...and now the bags. check it out.

the picture at the top is a visual display we were required to create. it had to reflect the theme and feel of the store but it also had to fit into a super tiny space. i sketched it a million times before i came up with something i was satisfied with. thanks to my boytoy (he will KILL me for that) for painting the name and tagline on that sweet piece of wood i found. it says: uzuri: a fashionable environment. i thought that was pretty cute. i had fun doing this but the worst part of the visual display was carrying all that junk across the university of memphis campus. (take a second look at the table cloth, recognize the fabric??)

all in all i really enjoyed this project (even though i spent my entire spring break finishing it) and i feel like i learned a lot from it. someday i'd love to actually bring this store to life. i worked too hard on this project not to.

(yes i took these pictures with my phone in a bathroom stall. i was about to turn it in so it was very last minute)

(bag with booklet and tea)