Back in the spring, I got a text from my son's former lacrosse coach, Andrew. He was brainstorming jersey ideas for his annual summer league, ran across my Goodland font, and decided to reach out.

If you read my story on the Rams helmet design, you know that sports uniforms have always been one of my favorite design realms. Now I might finally get to design jerseys that would actually see the field...? Poke me with a lacrosse stick — am I dreaming?

Andrew's concept was to create four teams based on iconic Santa Barbara festivals and places. One of his coaches had made a design for Fiesta (inspired by our "Spanish Days" festival), but the rest would be up to me.

On top of that, the jerseys would be sublimation printed, so I had an unlimited palette of colors to play with, and could even incorporate subtle textures and gradients. Best of all, the jerseys were reversible, so I'd get to design a "home" and "away" version for each team!

I started with Goodland — using my Goodland font of course — and was asked to use a green and yellow color scheme because the team captain plays for the University of Oregon.

Prior to becoming Santa Barbara suburbs, Goleta was famous for growing lemons, so I chose a vivid leaf green and electric lemon yellow.

I tried different backgrounds and graphics, like a crate of lemons behind the numbers, and a lacrosse stick holding a lemon.

We settled on the orchard for both backgrounds, and Andrew suggested it would be fun to "borrow" the friendly retro Syracuse Orangeman, who I made into a G-hatted Lemonman.

I tested every available color combo for the numbers, but decided bright yellow was a unique look, especially over the white "away" jersey.

The final touches were adding the Hotshots league logo (colorized to match!), and team sponsor logos on the front and back.

Next, it was time to come up with concepts for the remaining teams.

A neon 1980s vibe felt perfect for SB's nighttime hotspot of restaurants, wineries and breweries. I tried a bunch of my own fonts (Ultimatum Velocity, Enemy Lines and Paradise Point Inline), but Sam Parrett's Hyperwave ended up looking the best.

A brick background and neon palm trees were the finishing touches.

In addition to Fiesta, Santa Barbara also has a big festival on the summer Solstice. I loved the whole Victorian "sun and moon" design fad in the 1990s, and navy and gold seemed like another unique color combo for uniforms.

Once I hit on the idea of Night on one side of the jersey and Day on the other, the design just clicked.

Stars and clouds made fantastic backgrounds, and my new Solaflare Serif font was the perfect match.

My final conceept was a tribute to SB beach life, with sky blue and sunshine orange, a diamond surfboard-style logo, waves and palm tree backgrounds, and of course Paradise Point for the number font.

I thought it was pretty cool, but the league was set at four teams, so one design had to be cut. Maybe next year...!

Once the rest were complete, I reworked the existing Fiesta design to match.

I simplified the design elements, and added a confetti background inspired by cascarónes, which you will be initiated with if you ever visit me in SB during Fiesta.

The final step was making files for the printing company. Having never worked with the dye sublimation process before, I got to learn a new way of getting things from screen to the real world, which I always find fascinating.

The printer required me to convert the colors from CMYK to PMS, and export the elements individually so they could reconstruct the designs to fit the template for each jersey size.

I held my breath hoping everything would turn out right.... and they most certainly did! Here's a look at them in action this summer (photos by Mitch Klopp):

My numbers and designs… on ACTUAL SPORTS UNIFORMS! I can die happy now.