For this project I had to close the laptop and open the sketchbook, to create the delicate hand lettering needed for Glam Be, a new beauty company based in New Zealand.
Powerful software can create outstanding work. However software is just one tool in a selection. For this project I had to close the laptop and open the sketchbook, to create the delicate hand lettering needed for Glam Be, a new beauty and cosmetics company based in New Zealand.
THE CHALLENGE
Glam Be was a very passionate company to work with. Fernanda who I liased with was absolutely committed to making the logo "Pink, Sparkly, and Womanly". The audience was open to all women aged 16 and older. The premise was to provide a very intimate and friendly style of beauty, building on each clients unique preferences and complexions. Fernanda was lear that the logo should be "clean, social media ready, glamorous". With her social media launch set for Septemeber the clock was ticking to get the logo ready for action.
THE GOAL
After sharing the competition audit, and the moodboard, Fernanda set a clear direction for the logo to head in. An elegant hand lettering icon, with smaller accompagning text. The icon should project the companies dedication to being; glamourous, womanly, and beautiful.
THE SOLUTION
How do you see your phone? How do you see others phones? Do we see them the same way? No, in fact we wouldnt. We would see our phone in the way you woudl expect. However we would see others phones usually upside down. As they would be infront of us.
I came about this discovery after seeing two girls sitting in my local bar with their phones on the table, browsing instagram. One would remark and the other would look over onto the screen of the girl opposite. She then looks over two or three times, as she tries to read the instagram handle upside down, and type it into her phone.
That seems like a lot of effort. So my objective was to create a logo that was reversible. An "ambigram" (great word)!
As such I experimented with creating letter forms that could be rotated and still read correctly. Working with in my sketch book proved very time efficient, as I could try out multiple iterations quickly (simply turning my sketch book to see if it worked).
The end result was the combination of san-serif, lowercase "gb" (Glam Be). I scanned my concept into the computer and vectorized it to create the final logo shape. I added a small amount of shading as I felt the shape naturally leaned towards the currently popular "Almost Flat" design style (think of the Netflix Logo).
The gold texture was difficult as I was aiming for a mature and womanly gold, with a soft glittering effect. Most references I had available divided this between yellow-gold and white-gold. While I needed something in the middle. The background was made a very pale pink at the request of the client. My prefered palette was the dark background as it brings out the detail in the type better.
As is the nature of Social media, there is a lot of holidays in a year, and each one comes with a different colour and flavour. As such I provided Glam Be with a selection of sizes and variations on the logos colour plaette so that It could stand out on any festive background.
