Earth Day ATX 2018: SeaLab Spreads More Cheer

SeaLab plans for Earth Day like most plan for their biggest family holidays. 2018 was no different! This year we spent more time thinking through our booth set-up, planning surprises to share the mission of SeaLab, sending our visitors off with lots of swag, and getting our hands immersed in dirt to bring something special to our community.

Austin experienced a severe weather warning the week of April 22nd (actual Earth Day 2018) so our Earth Day ATX Volunteers & Exhibitors voted to postpone our event until April 29th for the good of the community. The result? An expanded week of celebration and a festive event that honored the Earth while keeping the participants entertained (& dry!)

We love how everything came together. We had so much fun mingling with our fellow Austin Greenies. Before we tell our readers all about “how we did it”, we’ve got to share…

The Final Result!

Some of our SeaLab Crew in the final Earth Day ATX Booth. Three women in black stand smiling behind a black table cloth with the “SeaLab” Logo and Cal — the multi-color, one-eyed squid and the words: “SeaLab: We Design Experiences For Humans — www.sealab.io” A seedling station with a bucket of dirt, seeds, and compostable pots, the Green Cup Challenge Trophy, a blue canopy, and a sunshine day are all visible. Photo by Ashley Marie Sherwood.

Planning

We have so much fun brainstorming our Earth Day ideas each year! Almost as soon as the calendar turns over to February, we are searching for Earth Day ideas for our booth. In the past, we’ve done a community art project and a community craft and this year we set out to do something equally fun, family-friendly, and steeped in love for our Earth.

Our journey mapping brainstorm session in the park introduced some awesome ideas — while some ideas always end up being more feasible than others, we like to choose a variety! This year we decided on a few take-away goodies, a station for creating your own seedling to take home, colorful custom-designed “Cal” tattoos, and a charming underwater scene for kiddos and parents to pose and take photos in an Earth Day/SeaLab themed stand-in photo booth.

Preparations

Rather than simply bringing seeds to plant as one of our activities, we decided it would be more fulfilling to sprout some seedlings so that fest-goers could take home a tiny plant to nourish and grow. It could be quite disappointing to go home, fingers crossed, with a pot filled with dirt that you hope will sprout, and potentially never grow a plant or flower!

Photo 1: Three types of seedlings left to sprout on a wet paper towel. Photo 2: A blue bin marked “Seeds! Do not move! Cosmos, Marigolds, Sunflowers” Photo 3: A bed of sprouting seedlings wrapped in burlap, ready to be shared with folks at EarthDay ATX 2018! All Photos by Ashley Marie Sherwood.

We chose our plants based on the fact that they were easy to care for, and lovely seasonal flowers- Marigolds, Sunflowers, and Cosmos. Our super creative, front-end developer extraordinaire & resident green thumb, Ashley took on the task of germinating seeds and sprouting our little plants, then babysitting them until the day of the event. They were in good shape in their temporary, tiny peat pellets, up until the weather stopped cooperating. Because of the 8 day delay in re-potting during the event, a lot of the first batch, sadly, didn’t make it. Luckily, we still had time to grow some more before the new event date, and we ended up with over 120 happy baby plants for our friends at Earth Day to take home.

Photo 1: A view of our seedling station and our stickers + swag on the black table. SeaLab Crew member arms are visible. Photo 2: A front view of our seedling station with flats of seedlings waiting to be planted, an orange bucket that says “Let’s Do This”, stacks of compostable pots, and our Austin Green Business Leaders Emblem and “Platinum Level” sign. Photo 3: A top-down view of our seedling station with potted seedlings. All Photos by Ashley Marie Sherwood.

On the day of the event, visitors only had to spend a few minutes potting each seedling into a compostable container while chatting with us about the seeds, flowers, dirt, and our cool compostable pots. Earth Day doesn’t have to last for only the day of the festival!

Visitors to Earth Day ATX loved the chance to pot their own plants. We made a few in advance for those who simply wanted to “take & enjoy” but most people wanted to get their hands on the trowel. Both children and adults scooped, planted, covered and watered the sprouted seeds until we ran out of stock. Our compostable containers were a hit! Who isn’t delighted to learn that when it’s time for a bigger pot, all that has to be done is to plant the container straight in the dirt? Win!

Brand New in 2018: Custom Stand-In Photo Booth!

The stand-in photo booth was an all-around favorite addition this year. The vinyl banner was custom designed, in-house by our fabulous SeaLab designers — Founder & Chief Creative Officer, Heather & Illustration Guru, Mike. What better way to celebrate Earth Day than to go Under the Sea — which is, of course, the SeaLab way!

After our vinyl design was created, optimized, and sent off to our local print shop for creation, the next big part of the project was figuring out how to bring our idea to life in the real world. As pixel artists who generally create digital designs, we get excited when design challenges require a little elbow grease and exploration outside the comforts of our home offices.

Our vinyl creation just back from the printers, unfurled, with the face cuts in progress! Two underwater adventurers wave at the camera in an under the sea scene with Cal, the multi-color, one-eyed squid in the center. Photo by Heather White.

So it was an easy “yes” to dedicate a Saturday to sketching out ideas, visiting Home Depot for hardware and supplies, and spending the afternoon crafting our board in the comforts of the garage, one step at a time. By the end of the day, our creation had come together and we found ourselves with a custom-created 4’x5’ photo board with 2 sturdy legs on the backside to keep it upright.

Heather White stands smiling with the backboard to our photo stand-in booth assembled and ready for our beautiful banner to be attached.

The process of building our custom photo booth! Photo 1: A blank slate of boards with a pen on top — waiting for design. Photo2: The boards on the saw. Photo 3: The first circular cuts to make the faces of the photo stand-in booth. All photos by Heather White.

The backside hardware and stands for our homemade photo booth. Lovingly made by Heather White.

The final and possibly most important step of our creation required attaching the vinyl to the board itself and cutting out the face holes. While the original plan was to directly apply the vinyl to the wood, we decided last minute to try and maximize our use of both items by attaching our vinyl by way of velcro so we could easily remove and reattach at our leisure without needing to worry about the lifespan of the board itself and how folding the board up would affect our design.

A little sawing, sanding, and vinyl adding to wooden edges later, we were finished and all set with our photo booth preparations.

The final product in the wild! Our SeaLab stand-in photo booth complete with a purple banner depicting two underwater adventurers waving in an under the sea scene with Cal, the multi-color, one-eyed squid in the center. The booth is ready for visitors with two circles cut our for faces, a blanket in the grass, and a fun day at Earth Day ATX. Photo by Ashley Marie Sherwood.

The photo booth in action! Each scene has our purple, under the sea stand-in booth in the grass at Earth Day ATX. Photo 1: Heather and helper Fiona smile for the camera. Photo 2: An Earth Day Greenie takes a photo of a loved one in the booth. Photo 3: Ashley & Courtney test out the “Happy Earth Day, #EarthDayATX” photo booth. Photos by *Cal* Crew.

Parting Gifts

We love stickers! And our mascot Cal! And the color & vibrancy that goes along with both. Our booths have always been strong on interaction & creativity but when someone wanted to walk away with a bit of the SeaLab spirit we weren’t always fully prepared. This year we decided to change that by sending our participants off with stickers, Cal tattoos, and some of our other custom designed, Cal branded SeaLab “merch”: guitar picks, magnets, and lip balm.

An array of SeaLab stickers, guitar picks, lip balms, and magnets — all bearing the likeness of Cal, our lovable sea creature mascot — displayed on our black table at the Earth Day ATX SeaLab Booth. Visible on the table are also compostable pots with seedlings, decorated with SeaLab stickers, and the Austin Green Business Leaders Green Cup Challenge Winners Cup with a Cal Magnet on it and a plant inside. Photo by Courtney Wyrtzen.

Cal, Cal, Cal, everywhere! Our one-eyed, multi-color squid mascot was hand drawn on our sign (Photo 1) with the words: “GET a tattoo. TAKE a photo. Enjoy Earth Day!” Photo 2: A large Cal sticker on the back of the black phone case of a visitor to our booth. We love to see Cal on-the-go! Photo 3: A close-up of the Austin Green Business Leaders Green Cup Challenge winner’s trophy flanked by compostable pots & seedlings. Photos by *Cal* Crew.

The people, the weather, the preparation, the seedlings, the dirt, and the color and fun of our SeaLab booth made this one of our favorite Earth Day events (we say that every year, it’s always true!)

When it is time to start planning again in Spring of 2019, what will SeaLab think of next to celebrate Earth Day? Share any inspiration in the comments below!

Here are a few parting shots from our planning, preparation, and fun from Earth Day ATX 2018…

Photo 1: A faraway view from our SeaLab booth of visitors enjoying the photo stand-in activity. Photo 2: Signage attached to our canopy that is green, has Cal holding two leaves with a heart thought bubble and the words. “SeaLab creative. We create captivating and memorable human-centered experiences.” Photo 3: Honorary Cal mascot “Harley” standing near the Under the Sea Banner for the photo booth. Photos by *Cal* Crew.

Wow! We finally got a tablecloth and this one from Thomas Graphics in Austin, TX does not disappoint! Photo 4: A black cloth with a purple background and Cal in the center says, ““SeaLab: We Design Experiences For Humans — www.sealab.io” Photo 5: Our photo booth in-progress, a friends of SeaLab measures the boards with a small replica of the sign in the middle of the scene to guide design and show what is to come. Photos by Heather White

Did you go to Earth Day ATX 2018? We’d love to see your photos, too!

One last look at part of our SeaLab Team after a long, fun, rewarding day…

“Goodbye” after a long day! After returning the table and chairs for the event, Heather, Ashley and two helpers walk across the lawn at Huston-Tillotson University campus. Black SeaLab t-shirts and SeaLab buttons adorn our lovely crew. Photo by Courtney Wyrtzen.

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