Andrew Kelsall | Graphic Designer

This is the follow-up post to my previous article How Twitter aided my latest Logo Design.

Blue Drift Pottery is a unique company that makes “pottery out of recycled materials” (or upcycling), which was set up by Cathleen Savage and based in Colorado, USA. The Blue Drift website site explains:

After much trial and error, Cathleen developed a working method that allows the bowls and bases to take their own form with a little guidance from the artist. The result is organically shaped vessels that would be difficult to reproduce by machine. And no two pieces are alike. Some vessels use other found and reused items, such as latex rubber tubing and old jewellery.

Cathleen contacted me regarding a logo design that would convey the uniqueness of the pottery she made. The images below show some the vase’s and their very distinct and contemporary style:

Vase by Blue Drift Pottery

Maria Vase by Blue Drift Pottery

Shell Vase by Blue Drift Pottery

Spiral Vase by Blue Drift Pottery

At first glance, it would seem like a fairly simple task to create a logo for this company. Not so. Whilst visions of pottery-inspired logotypes spring to mind, a questionnaire I emailed Cathleen revealed to me that Blue Drift wasn’t just limited to Pottery.

In the future, Blue Drift may create Jewellery, too. The word ‘pottery’ was required to be interchanged with the word ‘jewellery’ for a second logo at a future date. In light of this critical information, I set about creating a unique logo for a very unique requirement.

The Logo Design Process

After reviewing the detailed answers I received from the questionnaire, my mind was buzzing with ideas. In contrast to my normal work process, I didn’t do any mind mapping. Whist the mind-mapping can be very important, there are no solid rules when it comes to getting ideas on paper. Sometimes, letting your creativity flow is more important that following a rigid process.

◥ As always, I sketched out my ideas about the logo design straight down onto my Moleskine Notebook. Even though this photo shows a landscape view of my drawings, the very icon a drew was close to the final design. Sometimes, first impressions are the correct ones.

◥ Here, I highlighted another possible candidate icon for the logo design.

◥ This was another variation of my first and initial idea, although I felt this type of icon was becoming a little too out-there, so to speak.

◥ More concepts explored. As can be seen, I use graph-paper to help structure my concepts. Sometimes, the squares can be a hindrance to the design process, but not in this case.

◥ More conceptual work, where I explore using an icon based on the letter B.

◥ After a break from designing, my son drew a picture of my on a spare notebook page. I’m not sure if I looked that unshaven—but maybe my eyes did look somewhat wide-open from too much coffee! So, my next set of sketches were done the following day after some rest.

◥ After several rounds of loosely sketching icons, I collated my chosen concepts onto a single page for review. Sketching them out all again somehow helped me to focus on the shapes and forms in a very personal way. If I worked straight onto the Mac, I would loose this connection with the initial design work.

◥ Oh, one more concept that popped into my mind at the last hurdle—a 3D B shape.

This is my write-up on the first set of proofs I sent to Cathleen:

Concept a (page 3/4) shows a design concept based upon the letters B and D, combined into one symbol. This is the simplest of all the designs I have done for you. My main focus here was to create an icon that could easily look like a very clear stamp-styled symbol, that will work at even the smallest of sizes. As can be seen in all 3 variations (a1, a2 and a3), the logo can be used in different proportions and sizes to fit a variety of applications.

Concept b (page 3/4) shows a design concept which is, as I consider, “really far-out there” in terms of its dynamic nature. After reviewing your questionnaire, I formulated a concept that would enable the very unique nature of your business to be translated into a very modern and forward-thinking icon. The icon itself contains, although subliminally, the letters B and D in a very un-obvious way. It has a very 3D style and attempts to capture the uniqueness of your pottery (and future jewellery products?) with use of segmented blocks. This logo would also translate very well into a web-2.0 style logo, whereby gradients and even textures could be used in these segments to convey different aspects of your company, i.e., Pottery and Jewellery.

Concept c (page 4/4) shows a design concept that aims to capture the imagination and the ethos of your pottery works. After viewing your works online via Twitter Pics, etc, I designed a very fluid logo that represents the style of work you undertake. Again, a subliminal B (inner ovals) and D (outer shape) are present, but in a very limited way. The icon (like the rest of the designs) can be used on it’s own or with the text, too. *I have designed once of the B+W logos with the word Jewellery, so you can see how any of these logo designs will translate.

Concept d (page 4/4) is an addition font that I though may work, instead if the sans-serif styles in use

◥ After setting to work creating vector versions of 3 chosen icons in Illustrator, I spent a fair amount of time researching typefaces for the logo design. You’ll notice here that not only did I present three sets of logo concepts, but included some scans of my final pen drawing as additional options.

They were neat and tidy, and I thought including them could present Cathleen with more options. I don’t do this in every logo design. Sometimes too many options is a bad idea, but in this case, I thought it prudent to do so.

◥ This is how the B concept (3rd image above) turned out on the first set of proofs.

◥ Pleasingly for me, Cathleen liked my very first initial idea I produced. After finalising the first proof of the initial logo icon, I experimented with some differently-styled typography for Blue Drift.

◥ This is how the icon looked with a little colour, set to the right of the typography.

◥ Here, I have selected varied tones of the chosen colour scheme.

◥ Here are two black and white variations of the chosen concept. Notice the TM symbol, as the logo is due to be registered by Blue drift.

◥ This version of the logo is crafted for possible use as a sticker-design (to place under the upcycled pottery). It was just an idea that wasn’t taken any further.

◥ When the formation of the logo was complete, I suggested a Pantone® colours, based on the chosen blur/brown scheme.

◥ This is a photo of a printout of the logos, showing the colour and B+W versions.

◥ For the B+W version of the logo, I chose Pantone Black U. For more information about other Pantone® Black choices, you may want to take a look at my article The Professional Designer’s Guide to using Black.

The final logo typography was based on the following weights of Aller:

• Aller Italic & Aller Bold Italic for word BlueDrift

• Aller Bold for the word Pottery

• Aller Display for the TM & ® symbols

◥ Final Black & White version

Branding Concepts

Whilst designing the logo, I couldn’t help but think about the varied ways that this logo could be presented as part of a branding-style for both print and web use. Here are a few visions of this design style I had in mind:

◥ Here, I have experimented by overlaying a black version of the logo with transparent areas in the logo icon.

◥ Same in white, with equal impact.

◥ Another idea I had was to encompass any pattern with the confines of the icon. I can see where this could be implemented.

◥ Just for fun, but I think it looks the part.

Conclusion

This was a fantastic project to work on. I also learned a lot whilst producing the designs. My techniques were refined further and I feel that I produced a logo design that truly represented the Blue Drift Pottery brand.

What do you think? I’d love to hear any constructive criticism or your opinions on the designs…

A couple of months ago, I was contacted by a client who found me via the Mashable Twitter list 85+ of the best Twitterers Designers Should Follow. This quite surprised me, because at the time, I didn’t really know the “laws of Twitter” in a sense. I think I tweeted out way too many links of my own blog posts than other peoples. Now, however, I  mostly post links from other blogs and resources with the odd link of my own a couple of times a week (apart from socialising too, via @AndrewKelsall).

Not only was this how I was “found” by a client, but Twitter turned out to be my primary research tool.

A year or so ago, I knew nothing of Twitter. Now, however, this new social behemoth has provided me with a great logo design project that I wouldn’t have received without it.

The logo design process I am currently writing on this project is quite extensive—and I’ll be posting it here on AndrewKelsall.com as my next post next week. The above image shows a snapshot of the logo as a printout. Be sure to get Free Updates via Email or RSS so you don’t miss the forthcoming article

Project Start

Edit Websites is a powerful web solution that enables its users to effortlessly edit their websites with little or no web-skills. There will be five website services in all, with Edit Websites comprising of Holiday Edit, Church Edit, School Edit and Plus Edit. All of these sites are still in development, except for Church Edit, which will also be re-branded soon.

Kyle Cottington, the man behind the whole operation tasked me to design a cohesive set of logos that work both individually and as a whole. As an existing client, Kyle hired me to work on one concept that would work for all five logos.

My first step was not to start designing on the Mac, but to conceptualise my thoughts with pen and paper. My tools of choice are a simple black Bic® Ballpoint pen and a MoleSkine® squared notebook. The image below shows how I started the logo design process:

The idea behind the Concept

The whole selling point of the Editwebsite system is editability. With this in mind, I set out to design a set of logos that simply and constructively conveyed this message with the use of shapes or blocks that fit together. This was a simple idea that formed a branding identity that conveyed the right message.

Next Steps

When I sketched-out several pages of designs and some mind-mapping, I designed very rough icons for the logos in Illustrator, presenting them to Kyle as an emailed PDF.

I always include a cover page in the PDF, showing the Job, client number/codes, project name and date. I then proceed to explain the designs and the decisions behind the concepts. The image below shows a typical cover-page layout (text here is blocked-out due to client-designer confidentiality).

The following images show the rest of the six pages from the first set of proofs. I have also highlighted the text adhering to each concept. Also, in this first set of proofs, I have provided scans of some of my sketches as alternate options for Kyle to review. I feel it adds a more personal touch to the whole process, as well as saving time which is better spent in the latter stages of design.

Plus Edit logo with Capital “P” variation + Additional sketches

This logo uses a slanted + symbol, very much in the same ethos of your original logo. I have designed the symbol with blocks, with a slightly 3D appearance to show a sense of depth.

Schooledit Logo + Additional sketches

The only symbol that can represent any School, from junior to Uni, etc, is a shield/coat of arms symbol. As can be seen, it’s made of blocks and features the letters “se” to reinforce the meaning behind it.

Churchedit Logo + Additional sketches

Again, blocks are used to form a church window. Although not all churches have such windows, they’re instantly recognisable.

Holidayedit Logo + Additional sketches

After a fair few sketches, I thought that the sun is the best universal symbol of a holiday, without giving the wrong impression of a “travel company”.

Editwebsites Logo + Additional sketches

This logo is the only “true 3D” one, as it encompasses the whole set of logos and ties them all together. Not only does it show that the company has many facets, but like the others, shows the building block concept…and a more subliminal letter “E”.

Here is a snap-shot of the Adobe Illustrator® file I was using to create the vector logo forms. I have turned on all the 20+ layers on at once so you can see how I like to just copy, paste and replicate things randomly until I achieve the desired forms. To me, I find it much easier to work this way, rather than constantly lining images up and creating “proper” layer names in these early stages, as it hinders my creativity I feel.

After the first set of logos were reviewed by Kyle, it was agreed that the concept worked, but both the Plusedit and Churchedit logos needed amending. It was thought that the Plusedit emblem resembled an emergency cross, so something less clinical was required.

Set 1: Plus Edit Logo. Changed to version 3 from sketches on previous proofs.

Set 2: School Edit Logo. Shield is curvier and has a more appealing look. 2G-2L show what the logo would look like without the CE letters.

Set 3: Holiday Edit Logo. Colour changes and options.

Set 4: Edit Websites Logo. Cube logo recreated with minimal amount of rectangular panels for clarity. Border added for overall aesthetics and appeal. Colour emphasis placed onto the word “websites” to give a more unified look across all logos in the set.

Set 5: Church Edit Logo 1. Crucifix design made into a formation which could resemble a priest or person to some viewers. Matches the graphic styling of the other logos in sets 1-4.

Set 6: Church Edit Logo 2. Crucifix design created in the same style as the Plus Edit icon.

Set 7: Church Edit Logo 3. As Logo 2, but with a family silhouette added. If you want me to explore this option further, using either less people or different poses (i.e., a more conservative approach, with just people stood) please let me know and I will revise it.

The Image below shows how I selected the Pantone® colours to be used in the logo design. As well as Pantone® Swatchbook (Coated & Uncoated), I had two books from my local printers, which show how the certain swatches will print in CMYK on their presses.

The Image below shows how I choose to represent what Pantone® Colours I proposed. It shows the colours together with their codes. Here ‘PC’ means Pantone Coated (often just referred to as ‘C’). In all likely-hood, Only the darker colour (in this case Black 5 PC) and the darker orange (Warm Red PC – or Warm Red C, depending on the printer) would be used, as the Warm Red could be used as a “gradient-colour” into “gradient-lower-tint“. However, I have chosen to display a 3-colour Pantone® Set for completeness.

Nearing the end of the project, I had made some more changes to the logo designs, namely altering line widths on the School Edit and Edit website logos. Also, I altered the School Edit shield, so it looks more curvy and 3D.

Finally, I produced four separate versions of each logo: Gradient (optional for web use), Duo or Tri-tone Pantone® coloured ones for print use (or simply used online as non-gradient option), Greystyle for print use (fax, etc) and Black & White (B+W).

In the set of PDF proofs below, I have also given a few more colour options:

When all the logo designs were approved, I set about finalising the designs, making sure all the vector paths in Illustrator® were joined, with no stray points. The image below shows the logo designs in outline mode:

After the colours were agreed, this is the final set of proof files I sent Kyle, with the finalised colour combinations and Pantones® included:

The Final Logos

The image below shows the set of logos together without colour, so you can see the formations of the design work, with the bias of colour:

To Conclude

This was a great project to work on—and it was quite a challenge I must admit. Given that there were five logos that needed to work together as a whole—and with 4 different versions of each concept (Pantone®, Gradient, GreyStyle and B+W), this was a project that demanded attention to detail. I enjoyed the process thoroughly, reminding me of another set of logos I produced for St Luke’s Church.

I know this article has been rather long, but I wanted to show the entire design process from start to finish. I’ve been reading other designers’ posts lately, with snapshots of the logo concepts, but lacking the detail on how their designs were presented.

I hope this post has given you an insight into how I work. If you have any questions or comments about this article, please feel free to leave your thoughts below..

I was approached by David Fletcher from the Woodlands Community Church in Sheffield, England, after viewing my logo designs for St Luke’s.

David stated that the characteristics of the logo would have to have be: simplicity, community, purity, peace, vibrancy, modern and natural. David had one idea in mind for the logo design, but he also wanted another concept altogether.

The image below shows a section of proofs I sent David as part of a PDF (concept a). This was my own concept, which I thought fitted the project brief rather well. This was the logo description in the proof file:

a1 & a2 show a design concept based upon an oak leaf and acorn. The acorn can symbolise growth, which is a good message for any expanding church to convey. Also, the coloured-version of the oak leaf has an crucifix within it, that is more subliminal than obvious. I can make this more/less prominent at your request.

The second concept was based on David’s idea, which he drew a rough sketch of and emailed to me. Athough David isn’t a designer by any means, the sketch was good enough for me to gage what he wanted in the design. The whole concept was way to busy initially, but I managed to simplify the whole look, structure and appeal of the design concept:

b1 & b2 show a design concept based on the sketch you kindly provided. I have simplified it into a more
meaningful and coherent emblem. This is a more complicated and less simplistic design compared to
concept a.

Although the first logo was well-received, David and the Church committee preferred the second concept. However, some members were wondering what the logo design would look like with various additions, such as fruit and a crucifix included in the imagery:

Obviously, such additions made the design look even more crowded and complicated. After they reviewed the designs, it was agreed that the first solution was simpler and clearer—and I was thankful they arrived at the same opinion I held.

After some final tweaking, this was the end result below. I may be doing a letter-head for the Woodlands Community Church soon, so I may update this post in the near future.

I haven’t gone into the smaller details (such as sketches, etc) in this post, as I’ve just completed another set of five logos for another company, which I will soon be writing on in much more detail. Be sure to subscribe to the Andrew Kelsall RSS Feed so you don’t miss it.

What do you think of the designs and colours? I’d like to read your opinions….

This is a case study for logo designs, identity, branding and signage I produced for a local Church Organisation, St Luke’s. It is one of my older projects, but I didn’t author a blog when I produced the designs, so now is a great time to talk on the brief and design processes.

I was asked by Pastor Martyn Sullivan at St Luke’s Church, South Elmsall UK, to design a fair few logo design concepts for them—and the additional organisations that were affiliated with St Luke’s. These were The Family Centre, The Hope Centre, The Rainbow Nursery (and Rainbow Preschool), LifeTime Ltd, LiveLink and The LiveLink Shop.

The Brief

The challenge of the brief was to create a set of designs that were both individual, yet obviously part of a branding and identity structure. For example, if “someone” saw both the St Luke’s logo and the Rainbow Nursery logo, they had to know that the designs were part of the same organisation.

Fortunately, the project had a decent budget (obviously not revealed because of designer/client confidentiality) so I could go ahead and design many pages of designs, along with an explanation of how the designs were to be unified.

Initial Logo Designs

Here are the pages/designs that I attained from the printers, produced in A3-size for Martyn and other relevant staff members to view:

1◥ This design was based on the St Luke’s logo inclusive of the image of a Bible with a bow tied to it. This bow was then used to promote the St Luke’s brand throughout the rest of the logo designs.

2◥ This concept was based on uniting the church and subsequent organisations with bands of colour. A horse and rider with a flag were used as a way to show the Church moving forward. In this concept, the actual church name was included in all the organisation logo’s too, making the connection very clear.

Sidenote: This logo set was really well-received, but wasn’t chosen as it was noticed that the horse symbol could be seen as a “crusading rider”—and subsequently be offensive to some religious groups.

3◥ The idea behind this concept was to utilise simple shapes to unify the shop, centres, charity and church. All the “button logo’s” were branded with the “Part of St Luke’s” tagline.

4◥ The classic shield concept. I gave quite a few options on the designs of this Shield Logo set. Each part of the organisation contained a symbol of its own to accompany the dove, which was used on the main St Luke’s emblem.

5◥ In a very similar flavour to the shield-concept, but utilising the box shape, colour and river to unify the organisation and church. As can [just] be seen, the connection works in Black+White also.

6◥ This concept was based on the Christian Fish Symbol, with each of the partner logos containing the fish that “spearheads the set”. This was the chosen concept—and the rest of this article is dedicated to exploring it…

Concept 6: The Logos chosen for development

As stated, logo design concept 6 was chosen by the client, as basically, it embodied the whole ethos of St Luke’s—which is a contemporary church that was “on the move”. Other “religious” churches in the area bore the crucifix, but St Luke’s wanted to stand out and be different, using a different symbol of Christianity.

◥ After some reasoning and variations on the main church logo designs, these two were chosen. Gone is the rigid, square box the previous logo was contained in. Now, the design is more fitting with the brush-stroke-centred design of the rest of this “logo family”. Two designs were created, with one bearing the tagline “A Church on the move“.

◥ The Rainbow Nursery logo. This, like all the logos in the collection, uses different weights of Helvetica Neue. There’s nothing ground-breaking about this font—there’s no need for it to be. It works well, with different, varied weights combined with tight tracking are used to create a contemporary look, whilst reducing the line-length of longer names.

TYPOGRAPHY ◥ The Rainbow Preschool logo. Similar as the previous one, except for the wording that creates a slightly longer line-length. All these logos displayed here show the “signage-versions” of the church logo designs, with a coloured-bar at the base of the logos. The stationary versions do not include this addition.

FORM & SHAPE ◥ The Hope Centre logo. As can be seen, the Christian fish symbol is contained in a circle in all the additional logo designs. This “device” is symbolic of a brush which “paints” the varied shapes. Here, a flame is used to symbolise Hope.

COLOUR ◥ The Family Centre logo. The business logo colours for each logo have been chosen to best suite either the notion or shape design. The Hope Centre utilised yellow—and this one a “Royal Purple”, I would hope for obvious reasons.

LOGO BRANDING ◥ The LiveLink logos. LiveLink, The LiveLink Shop and Lifetime Ltd are all part of the same sub-organisation within the St Luke’s organisation as a whole. Yeah, it gets complicated, so I decided to to make the logo branding match in regards to colour and form.

◥ I treated Lifetime Ltd slightly differently to the other two logos, as requested by the client, as it was the “head” of the sub-organisation. a “river” concept was chosen to emphasise “life” is a very gentle and non-direct manner.

◥ Here is the signage design I created for The LiveLink Shop. I have included the tagline “Part of St Luke’s“, as there was room to do so—and added to the purpose to the sign.

◥ I drove past the shop recently to take a photo of how the sign looks. Apart from the telephone wires hanging in the way, I think it does the shop justice. I’ve made the rest of the photo B+W to highlight it better—it was a poor photo from a low-res phone camera!

◥ This is the sign that I designed and handed to the client, ready for print. However, somewhere down the line, more text was added at the base before printing, which I didn’t do.

◥ Again, I tried to take a photo of it on my dodgy camera, after forgetting to charge my proper one, D’oh!

◥ This is the signage design for The Rainbow Nursery, although I don’t yet have a photo of this sign yet.

Letterhead Designs, Business Cards & Stationary

For each logo, I created a business card design with the usual business and contact details contained on them:

ST LUKE’S CARD, FRONT ◥ The front of this card is designed using just one spot [Pantone®] colour.

BUSINESS CARD, BACK ◥ The reverse is full-colour, as it is inclusive of all the Church, Charity and Organisation logo branding.

HOPE CENTRE CARD, FRONT ◥ Rather than display the designs for all the church logo designs, I will focus on the Hope Centre stationary. As can be seen, each business card is branded with its corresponding colour; fused together with a the partial fish symbol formation on the right.

BUSINESS STATIONARY, HOPE CENTRE ◥ The envelope design, compliment slip and letterhead designs all used the same colour scheme and graphical-orientations to promote a unified branding structure throughout.

BUSINESS STATIONARY, ST LUKE’S ◥ Unlike the business card design, the rest of the stationary just used one Pantone® colour to reduce printing costs. However, the whole branding still looked professional and coherent.

Project Summary

Overall, this was a fantastic project to work on. At times, it was rather challenging; keeping track of all the logo iterations, files, folders and paths/non-paths file versions—and not the mention the numerous design decisions made.

It was a much bigger undertaking than I originally thought, and I have progressed and learned much with the experience of the whole project. Not all the stationary is as yet printed, nor the web URL’s up and running.

When I look back upon the work I undertook for St Luke’s Church, related organisations and charities, I believe I have created a useful, coherent and original branding structure that stands-out from the crowd.

What do you think of the designs? In what ways do you think I could have improved upon the designs. Is there any aspect of the project you would have done differently? I’d like to hear your opinions…

Recently, my logo design has featured on a couple of design blogs, I’m Just Creative by Graham Smith & Dache, by Logo Designer David Pache.

Firstly, I felt quite honored when David Pache contacted me a few weeks ago―and asked if he could have the Black & White version of my new logo for his new article 100 brands of interest Part 2. A quote from the article reads:

This article is the sequel to 100 brands of interest, published on the dacheboard on December 4, 2008. After the last article and the feedback received, it was clear that another article of this nature was in order so, here it is! Over the past few months, I have been compiling another 100 brands of interest and have been very lucky to have such a selection to choose from. The standard really is very high.

My “AK” Andrew Kelsall logo featured amongst another 99 great logo’s that are all showcased in B+W. It’s a great read, and I recommend that you check it out at some point.

Secondly, I submitted the more illustrated “ribbon” version of my logo design to Graham Smiths Logo Design Roundup Part 5 article. A quote from the article reads:

This is the fourth part in a series showcasing a collection of logos and brand marks, self submitted by a bunch of designers and creative folk in many creative areas. These designers use the logos to sell, promote, brand and market their various skills.

I has been great to get my new logo design ‘out there’ beside from my own site, and this article gave me a chance to explain why I chose to design it in this way. I would recommend that you check this post out as well, as there are some great insights about other designer’s brands too.