Click here to view the embedded video.

I apologize for how dark this video came out (we were in an outdoor courtyard with no lights), but the sound is fine, so you can get the gist of the presentation. As I mentioned in a previous post, this is a video of my presentation to a group architects at an AIA Los Angeles event. I was one of seven speakers. We were each allowed 20 slides and 20 seconds per slide. There were approximately 50 people in attendance. I got to talk to a couple people afterward and received encouraging feedback, but I think my presentation was too general to really spark people’s interest. That will come as I continue to refine the idea.

I’m still super early on in concept development for my venture, so the idea is changing almost every week. Of course, ideas build on each other and I want to show the progression of thought, so I’m posting this up. I spent a good chunk of today on instantdomainsearch.com, trying to find a better available domain name than Vverdant. Gotta sleep on a few gems I came across. I don’t want to take too long though, as I’ve already seen one good name disappear before I could register it: fillvoid.com.

©2010 drewshula.com. All Rights Reserved.

Set 1: Vverdant logo concepts by Justin Valis: June 27, 2009.

1A – the bottom of the V is a taproot, the horizontal line creates the 2nd smaller V, the right side curves like a leaf, blade of grass or fern
1B – same but line is lower, the colors could be different on either side of the line
2A – the small V “slides” into the large “V”
2B – just seeing how a large V in first looks
3 – a hedge, high grass, field of green wheat, is cut down to show the large V. the top of the hedge would be like a saw tooth, the rest of the letters would be white letters, I was thinking of facebook’s logo
4 – like blades of grass or the trail of a rock skipping in water, w/ cursive or print
5 – the same hedge, but both V’s are cut out
6 – trying out different V combos
7 – the hedge goes up like a graph, or the hedge turns into a cityscape outline, the left of the large V curves like a leaf, blade of grass or fern

Set 2: Vverdant logo concepts by Justin Valis: June 27, 2009.

1 – 2 logos in one, they both share the same large V, similar to the first file’s #1
2 – further refinement of the previous one. Using “square root” to play with the 2 V’s and a plant’s root.
3 – bubble letters, because I felt all my other logos were too thin, because from what I read, verdant is suppose to be lush, I kept thinking of an overgrown garden on steroids and I can’t seem visualize that in a logo.
4 – staircase similar to the sawtooth hedge and graph
5 – blades of grass
6 – just trying to work w/ the double V
7 – trying to give the effect that you’re looking down into a box garden and the letters are make out of plants
8 – name split over a building, w/ little V flags on top
9 – trying to give the effect that you’re looking down into a rooftop garden of a highrise rectangular building, and the letters are made out of plants
* – enjoy the doodles

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My favorite concept of Justin’s is his use of the “v” as a square root symbol ( √ ) as seen in Set 2, number 2. Do you have a favorite? Feel free to leave a comment. And please also check out my previous post on logo design from June 23, 2009.

©2010 drewshula.com. All Rights Reserved.

I’m excited…. I get 20 slides and 20 seconds per slide = 6:40 to inspire and make my point. I’m working on my slides and pitch now. This event is put on by AIA Los Angeles. Pecha Kucha is a global movement — I had never heard of it, but they even have a .org. Google, is doing the same thing, but calling it Ignite. There are 9 talks in this video and most of them are worth watching:

Click here to view the embedded video.

©2010 drewshula.com. All Rights Reserved.

Founders at Work, by Jessica Livingston. 2007.

Last weekend I sat down at Bay Cities Deli in Santa Monica with my friend Justin Brandon for input on my idea for Vverdant. I wanted to meet with him, because I greatly respect his opinion on web related projects. He worked at Google and has developed several great websites, including The Road to Fondwa site for a film he directed and produced. Justin thought the concept for Vverdant seemed pretty solid and told me to go for it. He also turned me on to several great websites including the Four Hour Workweek Blog, and Venture Hacks.

Additionally, he let me borrow a copy of Founders at Work, by Jessica Livingston. So far I’ve read write-ups on: Apple, Gmail, Craigslist, and Flickr. It’s one of those perfectly timed reads and I can’t put it down. It’s amazing to read these narratives of people who succeeded at doing exactly what I’m trying to do: follow their passion, build a company, and create value for people.

©2010 drewshula.com. All Rights Reserved.

LinkedIn Founder & CEO, Reid Hoffman.

I was happy to read that Reid Hoffman, Founder and CEO of LinkedIn, also studied Philosophy before entering the business world.

I studied Architecture with a supplementary major in Philosophy at Notre Dame, and Reid earned a masters in Philosophy at Oxford. Some of my favorite thinkers are Socrates, Ayn Rand, and Friedrich Nietzsche.

Reid is a great role model. He has dominated in Silicon Valley, helping to finance over 60 companies, 25+ from initial conception. He has been an angel investor for:

facebook.com, digg.com, bioscale.com, nanosolar.com, lulan.com, taxipass.com, naseeb.com, technorati.com, grassroots.com, friendster.com, socialtext.com, realtravel.com, rhythmnetworks.com, ravenflow.com, targetedgrowth.com, wink.com, wikia.com, adventsolar.com, bioscale.com, ning.com, tagged.com, tinypictures.us, etology.com, winster.com, rupture.com, jaxtr.com, kongregate.com, powerset.com, care.com, funnyordie.com, ironport.com, flixster.com, flickr.com, last.fm, grockit.com, and sixapart.com

These are some major Internet powerhouses. Ironically, I had a temp position at Ironport in 2006 before they were acquired by Cisco. I was living in Oakland at the time and temping in “The City.” It was a fun experience — data entry into Excel spreadsheets for eight hours at a time, hahah…. I also temped at Wired magazine during that period (answering the phone at the reception desk = BIG TIME BABY!) before I moved to Los Angeles in 2007.

Getting Reid Hoffman to invest in Vverdant, would be the equivalent of an up-and-coming rapper getting a co-sign from Jay-Z. Let me go brush my shoulders off….

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Vverdant logo mockup #1 by Lawrence Santiago: June 23, 2009.

Vverdant logo mockup #2 by Lawrence Santiago: June 23, 2009.

Vverdant logo mockup #3 by Lawrence Santiago: June 23, 2009.

Vverdant logo mockup #4 by Lawrence Santiago: June 23, 2009.

Then Lawrence started working on an idea for the slogan, “To the Power of V.” This has a lot of great potential. As he pointed out, it could be used to say, “Raise your impact to the power of V,” or “Increase your reach to the power of V,” etc….I love this mirror image “v” concept.

Vverdant logo mockup #5 by Lawrence Santiago: June 24, 2009.

These got me excited and I started sketching:

Vverdant logo sketches by Drew Shula: June 23, 2009.

We’ll be working toward finalizing these concepts soon. Until then, leave a comment to let me know what you think!

©2010 drewshula.com. All Rights Reserved.

The presentation format at Bloblive is to speak for 90 seconds and then receive 3 minutes of feedback from the audience. There were about 100 people there and the idea was generally well received. One guy thought I might be “late to the game” though. What do you think? Check it out:

©2010 drewshula.com. All Rights Reserved.

A great note of encouragement (below) from my friend Faust, who is a Director at a major oil company. More reason to push forward….

_________________

Drew Shula: Faust has sent you a message on LinkedIn.

Date: 6/17/2009

Subject: Your Vverdant Concept

Hi Drew–
Very good concept. I strongly believe in green in all aspects of living. If we can get the fuel issue under control in this world, we will have a better environment. A very complex issue as we found out by going into bio-diesel production in CA. Hopefully we can all strive for the greater good without profit as the sole motivator. Keep up the earnest work and with your motivation being the greater good, I can’t see how you can fail.

-Faust

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As an addendum, it’s amazing how prevalent social networking sites like LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter have become in our professional lives. I communicate on these platforms daily and love the ability to easily network with friends and business associates all over the world. Eventually we will have all the green builders on one platform as well….Vverdant, coming soon….

©2010 drewshula.com. All Rights Reserved.

Remember the “If you build it, they will come” line from the 1989 Kevin Costner classic, Field of Dreams? I think the same line can be applied to Vverdant.

If I build this site, they will come….The critical mass of users is out there. The green building (GB) community of architects, engineers, building owners, financiers, etc. is huge and global. The entire industry is pushing toward green for new construction, as well as toward retrofitting our existing built environment.

Green building is the future of architecture and Vverdant seeks to be the knowledge center for this growing industry. A news aggregator, job board, social network, and event calendar, all in one. A homepage for green building professionals. I believe in the concept. Time to make it happen.

©2010 drewshula.com. All Rights Reserved.

Here you can watch videos of short talks from people who are changing the world: Al Gore, Bill Gates, Cameron Sinclair, Bill Clinton, Frank Gehry, William McDonough, and hundreds of others. TED stands for, “Technology, Entertainment, Design,” but has gotten bigger. It now brings together, “The world’s most fascinating thinkers and doers, who are challenged to give the talk of their lives.”

If Vverdant becomes what I want it to, I’ll be at TED soon.

©2010 drewshula.com. All Rights Reserved.