Rick Lewis

With this issue, another successful Top Design Contest has come to a close. We received scores of entries representing every niche of products sold by distributors. Once again this year, Rick Lewis, president of Stratis Print Communications, Long Beach, Calif., took Best of Show, along with staff graphic designer Louis Nidorf, also from Stratis. This year's award was for a 139-page book that depicts a compelling, focused journey through Cuba. The book is comprised of photographs taken in Cuba by 18 students and two professors from Brooks Institute of Photography, Santa Barbara, Calif. Details can be found on page 24. One Platinum Award was presented this

Cuban culture is put into focus by Stratis Print Communications Whittling down thousands of photographs into a 139-page book that depicts a compelling, focused journey through Cuba is no small feat. But Rick Lewis, president of Stratis Print Communications, Long Beach, Calif., and staff graphic designer Louis Nidorf accomplished just such a challenging task in designing Cuba: Framing Time. Comprised of photographs taken in Cuba by 18 students and two professors from Brooks Institute of Photography, Santa Barbara, Calif., the book captured Best of Show in BFL&S' 2003 Top Design contest. Where did Lewis and Nidorf begin their design process? "We started with deciding

Welcome to Hollywood, where extravagance is standard and creativity abounds. Standing out here can be a challenge and making a name for oneself often comes from the little things, like Christmas cards. Don Dorsey, a show producer, musician and creative consultant, makes it his mission each year to develop extraordinary Christmas cards to send to his clients. This year he went to his longtime friend, Rick Lewis, owner of R. Lewis & Associates, Long Beach, Calif., for help. To provide a sense of how creative this card needed to be, one needs to know that Dorsey has designed fireworks and laser shows at Epcot

A lifetime of creativity pushes Rick Lewis to the No. 1 position of this year's top designers for BFL&S. The oft quoted sports adage says, "It's not winning that is important, but how you play the game." But for Rick Lewis, president of ProForma Preferred Systems in Long Beach, Calif., how he plays the game is a big part of why he wins—and boy, does he. In addition to winning seven awards in the BFL&S Top Design Contest in 2001—including Best of Show—and gold and silver medals in commercial printing in 1999, Lewis also won awards from the Admissions Advertising and Marketing

Platinum Award: Direct Mail. Promotions Made Easy. Designing direct mail pieces isn't rocket science, but it sure helps to know some fundamental rules of marketing. And one of the most im-portant ones is to know who you're writing for. Rick Lewis, president of ProForma Preferred Systems, Long Beach, Calif., never seems to have any trouble remembering who his audience is. Unfortunately, that's not always the case for everyone else. "So often, designers design for themselves," opined Lewis, "They design for what they like, not what their clients would like." Lewis, however, does just the opposite—and it's working.

Building the Future From the Past. Just north of L.A., perched high on a hill west of the Santa Monica mountains, lies the prestigious Brooks Institute, one of the world's leading photography schools. For 50 years, the Santa Barbara-based institution has excelled at teaching students the fine art of photography. However, marketing itself aggressively—that's another story. Strange as it may seem now, in this age of art as commerce, that's the way it was back then. Art and artists were the school's primary concerns. As long as the school maintained its excellent reputation, marketing, it was thought, would almost take care of itself. However, when