The Client

Doug and his daughter Alyssa reached out at the start of 2021 looking for some assistance with their new clothing line they had started during the pandemic. The original phone call was about providing consultation in regards to their self-built GoDaddy E-Commerce website and their social media platforms. After spending some time chatting with them and examining their website, the conversation quickly switched gears towards more of a need for a brand – so our first task now became a logo design to give them the tools to start building on a specific brand.

Conceptualize

During our initial telephone conversation, I quickly learned that all the designs used on their outdoor-focused products were original drawings done by family and friends. I instantly had a light-blub moment, realizing that this aspect of their business not only gave them a unique selling point for their apparel but also a perfect starting point for their brand!

Doug and I went through all the designs on the website and picked one that we both felt would be a perfect representation of their business – so off I went.

Create

I had Doug and Alyssa send me the original drawing of the design created by one of their family members and began by editing it down. The original drawing was a little bit too complicated to serve as a logo, so I removed some of the smaller details from the drawing.

After I created a more simple version of their drawing, I began to pair it with more logo-focused shapes, textures, some different fonts, and two different types of trees. With the understanding that this logo would be involved in a ton of silk screening and embroidery, the main idea was the old adage of K.I.S.S. 

Once Doug and Alyssa had a chance to review the initial concepts and discuss them with their friends and family, they decided to move forward with a combination of a few of the designs. They liked the main font found in the bottom-right one, the more open-looking trees, the tilted head position of the deer, and the addition of a ‘divider’ with the tag line of the company – all very simple revisions to combine into one design.

The final design was selected from the refined concepts (bottom-right as shown above), so I broke out the paintbrushes and started added a bit of colour. I always try and provide my clients with a number of colour/texture combinations and this was no different. With a business whose clientele are mostly hunters, fishers or those who enjoy the outdoors, I did some research into the best colour palettes to use. On this rare occasion, I also include some texture fills as ‘camo’ is almost a cliche in their industry – but I thought it was a necessity to show.

Communicate

This project was amazing to work on. Having friends and family create unique artwork that you use on ALL of your products is such a huge differencing point for their business, that I just had to incorporate it into the logo design. The imagery is strong, the fonts are appropriate and overall the design definitely communicates their brand message of “Stay Legendary”.

After the completion of the logo, I also had a chance to have a consultation phone conversation with Alyssa about their website/social media channels in an effort to assist her with bringing the new brand into effect, how to improve on its SEO rankings, and overall design asethtic.