Our goal was to make a cookbook that was usable and didn’t break the bank, either to produce or to buy. We opted for a 2-color cover and 1-color interior, designing for no bleed on the inside pages to save on printing costs. It was important that the book be truly usable in a friendly kitchen way. What were the important elements to accomplish this? A) Readability – both in font selection and text layout; B) Accessibility – a book that would lay open without propping and not requiring page turns to complete a recipe; C) Personality – copy written to reflect April’s style, fun food related quotes throughout, and space for the cookbook user to write notes.

I believe we accomplished all that, and it was a team effort. Besides April, her family was fully part of this book’s creation. Her daughter, Hana, interned with me for the summer specifically to work on this project. She did a terrific job! For anyone that has put together a 160 page cookbook you know that the devil is in the details and Hana was right on those.

With Hana checking all the layout details and making copy edits, I got the fun job of designing the cover. (Hey, experience has some clout.) Sunny Point’s logo is a cheery orange sun, which was perfect for the “Dawn” part of the title. I went with hand drawn stars for the “Dark” and used a strong diagonal division of the two colors to make a bold cover.

And, I have made a good half dozen of the recipes out of the book since it was released – all with excellent results. Perhaps there is cooking hope for me yet.

Copies of the cookbook can be purchased via the Sunny Point Café blog store, or at the restaurant.

It is hard to stop once a bunch of creative and somewhat wacky people get going. Soon we had a list of eggs in various attire and the idea for a calendar was born. Many thanks to Keith for the original thong idea, working with us as we hashed through the other ideas, and for being willing to brave creating all images for us. I believe he had some interesting shopping trips to obtain the props needed for the photos.

A grand time was had by all as we developed the sayings to go with the new images, and I spent a bunch of time scouring the web for non-traditional holidays and celebrations. Then the idea was hatched (ha) to have a percentage of sales benefit Planned Parenthood of Asheville and add bonus coupons for discounts and free stuff!

Sample pages from the calendar are shown here. The full calendar will be available for sale starting October 13, 2010 at Sunny Point Café and at Malaprop’s Bookstore. Get ‘em while they last.

Home page of the Sunny Point Café's website includes a slide show of exterior images on the right, while the left side is used to post info about upcoming events.

We love Sunny Point Café. Amazing food, fun staff and of course incredibly convenient for us.

Their site is designed to be bright and cheerful, reflecting the style and feel of the restaurant. It contains all the expected and useful items – menus, hours, directions, contact info, employment application and links.

Then we had some fun… placing quotes and facts about bacon, as well as a series of slide shows which contain images from the building and garden construction, to staff tattoos and special events.

Sunny Point Café has received numerous accolades and media mentions. If you haven’t been there, we highly recommend it. They are open for breakfast and lunch seven days a week, and for dinner Tuesday through Saturday. If you have been, well go back again. We bet you haven’t tried everything on their menu yet.

Visit them online at: www.sunnypointcafe.com