Every July since 2009, Armadillo Studios has been crafting a set of humourous wallpapers to celebrate the always endearing “Calgary Exhibition and Stampede”:http://www.calgarystampede.com/. For better or worse, The Calgary Stampede is one of the defining elements of Calgary’s culture and identity. For many of us, it’s a huge aspect of our city’s stereotype and indentity and because of which it is always ripe for some good old fashioned ribbin’. And as I have done for the past few years, early last week I put out a call for sone witty suggestions for this year’s editions of the Wallpapers. We got sone great ideas and we had come up with a few witty ones ourselves.

Then “last week happened”:http://www.cbc.ca/news/business/story/2013/06/25/calgary-flood-economic-impact.html.

With a province and a city literally decimated by mother nature’s wrath and thousands of people looking to rebuild and regroup from the devistation, making fun of the Stampede just doesn’t seem right this year.

Now many are already debating whether or not the Calgary Stampede should actually take place this year, with less than ten days from the parade kick-off. But like the “Calgary Stampede organizing committee”:http://www.ctvnews.ca/canada/calgary-stampede-will-go-ahead-come-hell-or-high-water-president-1.1339295 and “many others”:http://metronews.ca/voices/krause-encounters/717057/why-the-calgary-stampede-must-go-on/, I believe that the city needs the Stampede (in whatever capacity possible) this year more than ever. After times of disaster and crisis, communities need a rallying point. A few months ago, Boston needed the Bruins and a few years ago New Orleans rallied around the Saints. This is why at this time, the city needs the Stampede. Now for most cities, putting on something like the Stampede is a gigantic and daunting task, to do it after the largest disaster to hit the region in over a hundred years would be near impossible for most communities. But this Calgary and it’s a beautiful beast of a city.

If anyone can do this, it’s Calgary and the amazing people of this city.

So in solidarity with the rebuilding of our beloved city and the great spirt of the thousands of volunteers and people all over this province, we’ve created a special Stampede Wallpaper this year.

The Stampede… It’ll take more than an epic flood to stop this party

PG-13 Version

Download: Zip File All Formats
Download: 1600 x 1200
Download: 1920 x 1200
Download: iPhone

Old Cowboy Version

Download: Zip File All Formats
Download: 1600 x 1200
Download: 1920 x 1200
Download: iPhone

*Now*, If you do decide download the wallpaper *please consider* donating to the “Canadian Red Cross on behalf of Flood victims”:http://www.redcross.ca/Donate/Donate-Online/Donate-to-the-Alberta-Floods or joining the “yycHelps.ca”:http://www.yychelps.ca/ project, spend sometime with your neighbours cleaning out or even pick-up “the Hell or High Water T-shirt”:http://store.calgarystampede.com/products/hell-or-high-water or buy “The Nenshi Bad Portraits Print”:http://badportraitproject.com/floodrelief.cfm. Let’s all band together and make rebuild this city.

*For those looking for the lighter versions* feel free to download the wallpapers from “2011”:https://www.armadillostudios.ca/stampede-wallpapers-2011-carnies-edition/ or “2012”:https://www.armadillostudios.ca/stampede-wallpapers-2012-stampede-centennial-edition/.

Armadillo Studios is happy to announce that we are expanding our reach from one end of Canada to the other.

Armadillo Studios is now operating out of two location in this fine country. Our home-base of operations will continue to be our beloved Calgary, but we are now also expanding with a satellite office in the Ottawa market.

With the advances in collaboration tools and video conferencing, the challenges associated with working across time zones and distance have been dramatically minimized. It’s because of these advancments and tools that Team Armadillo will still be able to provide our great web design services in two different locations at the same time. We’ve been able to hone this skill over the past few years through our work and collaboration with companies all across North America – working with companies and teams in Toronto, Chicago, Washington, Austin and even Edmonton.

Team Armadillo is incredibly excited to continue our work as an involved member of the Calgary web design community and we’re also excited to bring our hard working prairie attitude to the Ottawa Tech community.

If you have any questions or would like to get in contact with us for your next project, feel free to contact us at info@armadillostudios.ca or 1.800.974.3814.

Armadillo Studios Inc., is very proud to announce that we are not only a major sponsor, but acting as the online technical support for the “1st Annual Calgary Seniors Walk”:http://www.calgaryseniorswalk.com. The Calgary Seniors Walk is being put on by our good friends at the “Canadian Legacy Project”:http://www.canadianlegacyproject.org, a great Calgary based non-profit that we have been working with for a few years. As you can see from the event’s web site, it’s sure to be an exciting event:

The 1st Annual Calgary Seniors Walk will take place on Thursday, August 30th on Stephen Avenue Mall in support of the Golden Age Club (“www.thegoldenageclub.com”:http://www.thegoldenageclub.com). This unique walk event will take place during the lunch hour and will cover the four blocks on Stephen Avenue Mall in downtown Calgary with the goal to raise awareness and much needed funds for The Golden Age Club. The Golden Age Club offers a variety of social, recreational, health and outreach programs for Calgary’s seniors population.

(Read More…)

Today, January 18th, Team Armadillo is joining hundreds of web sites across North America in “blacking out in support of the anti-SOPA and anti-PIPA”:http://sopastrike.com/ movement.

And while it’s great news that “SOPA (The Stop Online Privacy Act) has been shelved by Congress”:http://www.zeldman.com/2012/01/16/ding-dong-sopa-is-dead/ for the time being, it still doesn’t address some of the underlying threats towards the web industry in North America. It’s a step forward, but governments north and south of the 49th parallel must show a greater understanding of the importance of this emerging industry.

(Read More…)

Earlier this month we teamed up with members of the Howard family and “The Event Group”:http://www.theeventgroup.ca to launch the new online home of the “Canadian Legacy Project”:http://www.canadianlegacy.org.

The Canadian Legacy Project is a new non-profit foundation dedicated to _improving the lives of disadvantaged youth, seniors and veterans and mobilize collective action in celebrating the legacy_.

The Canadian Legacy Project is in it’s first year of existence and is already working to help local Calgarians with the “Seniors Day Out this past September”:http://www.canadianlegacy.org/seniors-day-out and also “the 4th annual Veterans Food Drive”:http://www.canadianlegacy.org/events which will take place in November.

To help establish the foundation and build a strong following, we went about designing a unique identity for the web site. One that would invoke a sense of pride and honored tradition. As the main portal for information regarding the foundation, we wanted to create an engaging layout while also making it easy to navigate. We also utilized large colourful buttons to draw the users attention to some of the more important aspects of the site – such as the volunteer, donate and event pages.

We also established a soft and professional colour palette, with a combination of light greys and steel blue. We also created a unique maple leaf medallion logo for the Project as a way to reinforce the project’s commitment to Canadian Veterans, Seniors and our cherished past of servitude.

We are extremely excited to be working with the Canadian Legacy and to help them achieve their online goals. We look forward to seeing the foundation grow over the next months and to see the uplifting change that they plan to bring to our community.

_Sidenote: In November The Canadian Legacy Project will be working with Crown Surplus on the fourth annual Veterans Food Drive. Please check into the site over the next couple of weeks as the foundation begins providing more detailed information regarding the drive_.