Posts Tagged ‘brand identity’

Now I know that we have a reputation for developing very engaging identities for companies that sell direct to consumers (b2c) but we do love to get our teeth into a business to business (b2b) project and I’m especially delighted to share with you the Holdfire re-brand that we’ve just delivered.

We’ve been working with Mark Batt Rawden for the past four/five years now on various graphic design projects and I think Mark has been getting a little tired of me badgering him to let us create a new logo design for him. Mark was very attached to his old logo. He designed it himself, had trademarked it and couldn’t see the benefit in changing it. So for several years we worked within the parameters of Mark’s existing identity: pushing the boundaries whereever we could!

2011 is the year that Mark is serious about growing his business. He plans to double the turnover this year. And to that end asked us to design a new website, brochure, marketing literature and exhibition materials for him. He also very reluctantly agreed to us creating a new logo for him. We’re delighted that he did!

Here’s Mark’s old logo. I think the less said about it the better.

And here’s the new one. Smart eh? And not a wobbly line in sight…

After a briefing session with Mark and Lauren team Flourish got to work. We debated long and hard about whether Holdfire was Autumn or Winter in colour psychology terms. The brief was to create a smart and professional image for an engineering firm but Mark was very clear about creating something warm, approachable and accessible. We were concerned that Winter might be a bit cold and harsh for a company that specialises in self closing door solutions for the care home industry. It was this focus on the care home industry and the clients insistence at a warm and friendly identity that made us question whether Winter was the right season but in the end we were clear that the company should be the Autumn side of Winter.

We created three very clean and forward thinking logo designs for Holdfire as well as a very strong colour palette and brand identity. I’ll be blogging next week about Mark’s new ecommerce website but for now… Ta da!

Tagged as , b2b, brand identity, business to business, powerful branding in Branding, Case Studies, From The Studio, Logo Design

Denise Allen has been a regular visitor to the flourishing blog ever since I met her at Grow Your Business in April of 2009 and we were delighted when a couple of weeks ago she asked us to create a new identity for her baking business. Denise currently trades her business as Cupcake and Cookie Central and has been working through the night to bake enough cakes to sell at Surrey and Hampshire Farmers Markets.

Having recently moved to Hampshire Denise is getting serious about taking her baking business to higher levels and is keen to stop the exhausting cycle of weekend farmers markets and build up the commissions.

Denise recognised that in order to stand out from the competition and attract the right sorts of clients she needed a professional and engaging logo. Her brief was to create something that was fun, professional and most of all, communicated the love and attention she puts into each and every one of her cakes.And so without further ado, I present to you Concept One.

Concept One

Personally I love the font, the colours, the spots (yes, probably too much detail when small, but it would work well without the dots too…) and the cute piping bag.

And here it is in context.

Concept Two

This one feels a bit more corporate and we’ve played on the idea of a doily framing the cupcake. It’s a much more slick take on what Denise has at the moment and the cupcake image and doily could be used elsewhere on their own.

Concept Three

This one takes a bit of a different turn. Denise was unsure about whether the company name should be Cupcake and Bake or Cup, Cake and Bake. Both have very different connotations and we promised her we’d try out one option with the comma. In our initial brainstorming we’d sketched out a few ideas with tea cups, but they didn’t make the grade. Instead a delicious font which just exudes the emotion that Denise puts into her cakes and a heart icon to reinforce the idea of love.

This logo would work just as well across two words: Cupcake and Bake as it does across the three, so don’t let that skew your judgement! And finally option 3 in context.

So now over to you. Denise has a clear favourite but we’d love to know what you think. Which one “speaks” to you the most? We’re aiming to move more upmarket than where Denise’s business currently is so it’s all about looking fun, professional and like the cakes have been made with care.

Tagged as , brand identity, cupcakes, logo design guildford in Branding, Case Studies, From The Studio, Graphic Design, Logo Design

You’ve heard of Butlers in the Buff? Well get ready for Sera of MIB’s new concept for a band: Band in the Buff. I kid you not, this band will perform naked. It seems that the finer details are just being sorted but I understand that they will be naked save for a few strategically placed instruments covering their modesty…

I have to be honest, it’s not something that we’ve been asked to design before, but never ones to shirk a challenge, we rolled our sleeves up and got stuck straight in. The brief was to create something fun, NOT sleazy and high impact. We’ve created logos and websites for pretty much all of Sera’s bands to date so we made sure that this logo would fit in with the others whilst hopefully living up to it’s name. Do let us know what you think…

Concept One

Here’s what Caroline (our Studio Manager) had to say about the first concept: “It seemed obvious to us that we needed to design one logo that played with the Adam and Eve theme. As with all your logos, we’ve stuck to fonts that are bold, fuss-free and confident.”

Concept Two

Over to Caroline… “We thought a little stitched label would be a nice ironic play on the fact that all the band members are naked. This logo is simple but effective and has some little icons to carry across onto things such as buttons on your website, etc.”

Concept Three

Caroline says… “OK. We couldn’t help ourselves. We had to create an option that worked around a censorship theme! The graphic is subtle but the message is clear and comical. We’ve deliberately tried out a great, zesty green to give the message even more punch but this still works in the overall MIB colour palette.”

Concept Four

A bonus concept (we usually only present three), that Caroline was keen to show the client. “This last logo design is based around the same idea as concept two but we’ve labeled the logo in the form of a swing tag. We thought this design looked great on the T-shirts and felt we had to show you! We’ve tried a vivid red for this design which again, works so well with the rest of the MIB colour palette.”

Sera was delighted with the options and immediately came back with the response “Wowwwww we love them!!! …Looking fab!Thanks guys, soooo excited! Looks amazing! xx”.

We’re currently tweaking and refining a couple of the concepts before starting the website design so I will make sure that I upload that as soon as we have the first mockup.

Tagged as , brand identity, Logo Design, mib music, Sera Golding in Branding, Case Studies, From The Studio, Logo Design