Past Designs of the Week

WK 13 • March 2021

Menrva™ Brand

Brand Identity

Menrva was the Etruscan (a group similar to the Romans) Goddess of war, art, wisdom, and medicine. As a Hellenized version of the better known Athena, Menrva represents various aspects of knowledge and insight, which form the basis and inspiration of this fictional insure-tech company. The brand, at a glance, is softer and utilizes the Quicksand typography to provide a more rounded look to the brand. Furthermore, this rounding is reinforced in the logomark, which is an owl, as it was the historic animal form of Menrva. Within the owl, a singular rounded M forms the facial structure, which alludes to the company's first letter. A lilac and grey color palette adds the perfect amount of readability and softness to complete this identity.

WK 12 • March 2021

DinogramVR™ Brand

Brand Identity

Technology and design seem to go hand in hand, with the latter providing more opportunities to express and define how design will evolve. The immeasurable possibilities in VR are becoming a growing area in human-computer interaction design. With Oculus announcing its intent to build upon its already popular Quest VR goggles, I was inspired to create a brand for a fictional VR/XR startup. I felt that using animal imagery would help bring a sense of humor and openness to the brand, and I thus felt drawn to the idea of building the brand around a dinosaur. I came up with the name Dinogram, which combined the words "dinosaur" and the Latin word "gramma," meaning to write or record in a certain way. The dinogram logomark utilizes two elements, the dino (humorously displayed wearing VR goggles) and the three-dimensional container, which provides a direct allusion to the interactive environment found in VR. To further this brand's openness, I opted to included rounded corners rather than edges to create a softer look. This "softness" is enhanced by a beautiful humanist typeface, cabin, which furthermore adds to the brand's personality. Lastly, the color palette uses a leafy green color palette popularly associated with dinosaurs in cartoons, which further adds to its welcoming and familiar nature.

WK 11 • March 2021

Tholian™ Brand

Brand Identity

This fictional company's name is drawn from an episode of Star Trek: The Original Series, titled "The Tholian Web." As implied by the title, an advanced alien race, the Tholians, trap the U.S.S. Enterprise in an energy web. The aforementioned web and its distinctive orange-gold coloring are the inspiration behind this company's iconography and color palate. A criss-cross line pattern further implies this web imagery and is seen in off-white coloring on the business card. I selected wonderfully aesthetic geometric sans font, Sora, to complete this brand. This typeface, with its futuristic look, characteristically flat apices, terminal-less descenders, and overall minimal contrast, adds clarity and coherence to this brand.

WK 10 • February 2021

Shuksan™ Brand

Brand Identity

Mount Shuksan is a peak in the North Cascades National Park, rising 9,131 feet. The word itself comes from the Lummi word meaning "high peak." Being such a prominent geographic foundation, I thought it would make for a great company name. The fictional company, Shuksan, is a holding company of sorts and therefore does not require any specific brand allusions to a particular product or service. Rather, the company's icon and brand are drawn from the highly geometric shape of the mountain, which provides an angular look to the icon and related collaterals. The colors, which incorporate the blue-dark-blues, are inspired by Baker Lake (located at the mountain's foothills) and can be used as both contrast or gradient-based color schemes. The typography, epilogue, a 2-axes sans-serif typeface in neo-grotesque design provides the much-desired readability in a modern brand such as this.

WK 9 • February 2021

Boxwood™ Brand

Brand Identity

Boxwood is a fictional company specializing in making tree-free cardboard packaging from bamboo pulp, as bamboo is one of the fastest-growing plants on the planet. The identity for this company is inspired by several natural and allusive items. The color palette incorporates the green hue found in most bamboo species and a chocolate brown inspired by cardboard boxes. The icon takes the shape of a tree is formed in an 8-bit fashion from boxes, furthering the allusion to the company's primary product, packaging. Lastly, a robust geometric typeface, DM Sans, provides a readable logotype. Together, these attributes make for a coherent and thoughtful visual identity.

WK 8 • February 2021

Foliot™ Brand

Brand Identity

A typeface can often be the most simple rendition of a brand. It forms the textual basis by which a company's visual identity is communicated and henceforth provides the most minimalistic interpretation of its icon. This brand demonstrates this simplicity by incorporating a robust serif font, Rokkit, as both a logotype and icon. Foliot is a french word pertaining to a part used in early clocks, specifically a verge escapement that controls the rate at which a clock moves. The meaning of this word inspired me to thus create an identity for a watch company. The ethos of this identity is simplicity, and therefore, I used a black-white color scheme, which ensured maximum contrast and readability across any medium.

WK 7 • February 2021

Dōtaku Brand

Brand Identity

Dōtaku are Japanese Bells forged from bronze and were often intricately decorated. They were used as both religious and practical tools as emergency bells. This inspired me to create a brand representative of this historical item. I started by transforming the notable, truncated cone shape of the Dōtaku into a minimalistic icon. I then selected a sans-serif typeface that contained the necessary macron and possessed a degree of structure as well as readability. To complete the brand, I utilized the colors of the Japanese flag as an additional allusion to the origin of the Dōtaku, creating a rememberable red-gradient color palette in the process.

WK 6 • January 2021

Grok™ Brand

Brand Identity

Grok is a neologism meaning "to understand intuitively or by empathy, to establish rapport with." I thought that this would make for a perfect name for a fictional advanced technologies company. The typography, Rajdhani is unique, utilizing a modularized set of letterforms that appear futuristic and technical. Furthermore, the icon is a simplified interpretation of the letter "g" and takes its shape from the chevron seen in the letter "k" seen in the logotype. With a lime and green color palette, the Grok brand comes together as both modern and coherent.

WK 5 • January 2021

Pomona™ Brand

Brand Identity

Pomona is a fictional company with a unique brand story. For one, the icon is both representative and allusive. The structure is simply a letter "P" on its long edge. In a larger sense, this icon represents this company's location and name, as this is a deliberate allusion to the shape of the famed Griffith Observatory in Los Angeles, not far from the city of Pomona. The color gradient incorporates the warm sunny colors typically associated with Southern California. To bring everything together, I used a clear and geometric typeface by the Indian Type Foundry called Poppins, whose near-monolinear structure is both readable and relaxed.

WK 4 • January 2021

Zenik™ Brand

Brand Identity

The work Zenik comes from the phonetic pronunciation of the word "Xenic," meaning: of, relating to, or employing a culture medium containing one or more unidentified organisms. As this term refers to science, I wanted to design an identity for a fictional research company with diversified operations, hence Zenik Holdings. I wanted this design's logotype to be readable yet unique, minimalist, yet dynamic for this specific design. I settled on a fantastic open-source typeface called Tostada to fulfill this. The icon is unique, utilizing components from various letterforms in the Tostada font, and it is genuinely allusive of the multifaceted world of science. As a supporting type, I found Heebo, a variable sans-serif font with excellent geometric form. As a finishing touch, I used a simple, utilitarian, black, and white color palette indicative of a data-focused company like Zenik.

WK 3 • January 2021

Plural™ Branding

Brand Identity

This week's design is for a fictional software company based in Austin, TX specializing in AI. The iconography is a visual interpretation of the word, "plural" and is also designed to look like a minimalist design of Texas, albeit angled. To make this brand "pop," I used a semi-bold-and highly readable-typeface, DM Sans, that was enhanced by the purple/gray/black color palatte I chose. The end product is a brand that effectively conveys a modern look of a company with purpose.

WK 2 • December 2020

Arist® Brand Re-imangination

Brand Identity

Arist is a software company based out of Boston, MA that focuses on revolutionizing education via a text-based platform. In this re-imagination, I transformed Arist's current geometric logo by reimagining it as a text-chat bubble. Combined with an modern-yet-playful typeface, Mont (download below), and the existing Arist color palatte, this brand comes to life. The result is a brand identity that is not only modern, but representative of the company and its mission itself.

Downloads

WK 1 • December 2020

Sixty Second Sunday

Brand Identity+Animation

This logo was designed for FBLA-PBL’s social media initiative, Sixty Second Sunday, which highlights FBLA members and business leaders. The logo incorporates a modern, highly readable aesthetic, with a time-motif placed in the shape of an “O”. A related animation with the clock-symbol was also made to furthermore evoke this motif on social channels.

See the Animation→