We’re just getting back into a regular routine post Design Bloggers Conference 2014 (DBC) – and after this whirlwind conference, regular may never be again. It was a motivating and an inspiring few days, for sure! Filled with fun, fabulous advice, and friends new and old. Attending this exciting conference cemented our commitment to the blog for steve mckenzie’s and we’re thrilled to begin implementing some of what we’ve learned and what’s inspired us here with you!
We’re sharing all about our DBC 2014 experience with you in a two-part blog series so even if you weren’t able to attend, maybe you’ll feel as if you were there, even if it was just for a bit. Or, if you were lucky enough to go, hopefully you’ll enjoy hearing about it from our perspective…
For the steve mckenzie’s team, our DBC 2014 experience begun Sunday afternoon, at the party celebrating Dwell with Dignity’s first Atlanta makeover, featuring our friends Kerry Howard (yes, the same “Tastemaker” we shared recently!) and Brian Patrick Flynn, who worked on the design of the space, and a fantastic group of DIY experts and volunteers. We were thrilled to help this great cause, and look forward to doing more in the future! On our way out, we did have a little fun at the photo booth:
After the party, we were ready to get the DBC 2014 party started… literally, with the conference’s opening event at Atlantic Station hosted by Sunbrella and Traditional Home. It was a great time, and we met many new faces. The loft space Sunbrella had designed was just fantastic, and had us dreaming of in-town living!
DBC 2014 officially kicked off in a big way Monday morning with a Keynote address by Bravo TV’s “Million Dollar Designer,” Jeffery Alan Marks! We loved learning how he adds one thing in every space that’s an accident. What a smart way to keep things interesting!
In addition to Jeffery’s keynote address, we, like the rest of the DBC 2014 attendees, were greatly inspired by the floral on stage, including two of these amazing Ranunculus and Rose arrangements…
After ogling the floral, and absorbing all Jeffery Alan Marks had to share, we were ready to get to the “Business of Blogging,” an amazingly informative talk, which featured one of our all-time favorite bloggers, Palamoa Contreras of La Dolce Vita (celebrity moment!). We also met blogger, and landscaper extrodinaire, Jan Bills, of Two Women and a Hoe. Jan is a laugh and a half, not to mention brilliant. We have another blogger crush!
After another informative session on “Digital Content Marketing,” the 2014 Design Blogger Hall of Fame awards were announced. And, the big winner for “Best Overall Design Blog” went to none other than La Dolce Vita! Congrats to our friend Paloma on this much-deserved win!
The next session on “Building your Brand” was uuber popular. Our friend, and editor, Amy Flurry was one of the speakers and shared some secrets from her fabulous book, “Recipe for Press.” This was a session not to miss!
Celebrity designer, Timothy Corrigan offered up the next Keynote Address, and spoke to an enthralled audience on “Designing your Brand.” He spoke from such a unique perspective, sharing how he took his experiences from working in advertising to build his brand as a designer. He also doesn’t believe a room is well designed if it’s not comfortable – right on!
Day one of DBC 2014 ended with a wine tasting – yes, a wine tasting! And a fantastic talk on how to turn any topic into a lively and shareable story by Jeremy Parzen, who authors the wildly popular blog Do Bianchi, where he talks about wine and so much more!
Each of the three wines we tasted represented a different time in Jeremy’s life, the story he told us, and how he made it shareable. Not only were the wines wonderful, so was his speech!
Phew! That was quite a day… And to think, that was only day one. Day two was just as fantastic, if not more so. Like we shared earlier, DBC 2014 was quite an experience! We hope you’ll join us for our re-cap of day two, which we’ll be sharing here very soon!
If you attended DBC 2014, please let us know what you thought about the conference and who your favorite speakers were…