Logos ‘R’ Us
April 20th, 2010
Identity and branding work is always an interesting challenge. It’s not simply a graphic design exercise. An effective identity needs to do several things. It needs to convey, at a glance, what a company or product or service is about. It needs to reflect a company’s personality and essence. It should ideally be simple. It has to work in a variety of media — from business cards to print, signage, advertising and, of course, on the web.
By its very nature, identity work is a subjective, often emotional, exercise. The client has objectives, hopes, likes and dislikes that all have a direct impact upon the design process. We strongly encourage our clients to spend time looking at other identities as a way to narrow down what they are looking for, or to identify what they are definitely NOT looking for.
Most often, an identity project comes with a name already determined. But once in a while, coming up with a name is also a part of the assignment. And that’s even more challenging, as there are few names left in this world that have not been trademarked or used.
When it comes to identities and logos, there is no objective process or evaluation that will tell you exactly what combination of factors — name, typeface, symbols or icons, colours, descriptive taglines, positioning lines, etc. — are exactly right. We always say that you can never get it absolutely right. Often there are alternatives that are equally valid choices. In fact, it is our job to come up with and provide a client with such choices. We figure that if our client is having a tough time making a choice from the options we present, we have done a really good job.
But we do believe that you can absolutely get and identity dead wrong. We all have seen logos or names that give the wrong impression, are too difficult to figure out, that lack inspiration or freshness, are just too generic, or just plain ugly.
Here is round-up of some of the identity work we have done for clients over the past few years.
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We developed a theme for TELUS World of Science‘s capital campaign for the new science centre they are building in Calgary. While “Imagine” and “Action” have been put together before, we gave it a simple look. The science centre is well-known for the three rings that stand outside its current location, so we incorporated them into the wordmark in a subtle way.
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Fortess Mountain is a ski resort located in Kananaskis country, a short drive from Calgary. Although it has been around for many years, it has come under new ownership and is being completely overhauled. The owners requested a new identity that not only conveys ski, but also the majestic natural surroundings.
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Cybera connects researchers in Alberta together through “cyberinfrastructure”, enabling them to share and work together more effectively. With their new name, they wanted a fresh identity that would convey their high tech category. The symbol is a series of dots that in the exact configuration of the chemical symbol for cyberium.
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Earthen Vessel is in one of those “interesting”businesses. They sell one-of-a-kind funerary urns (yes, those things in which you place the ashes of loved ones) that have been created by artists. Nuff said.
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The World Petroleum Congress, Canadian Association asked Mosaic to create a website that would be a showcase and resource about Canada’s technology leadership in the oil and gas industry. We decided to “brand” the site as the “Canadian Energy Advantage” and created this identity for it.
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Our client, Albi Homes, decided to create a sub-brand line of new homes in one of their communities and wanted to give it its own identity, one that would appeal to a younger audience than their traditional customer franchise and that would convey a sense of aspiration. But they also wanted to leverage their existing name and brand awareness. The result was Albi Arrival.
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Albi Homes was adopting the BuiltGreen more environmentally-friendly standard of building new homes and wanted to let customers know about their new commitment. We dubbed the program “Albi Smart Energy Measures” and developed this logo for it.
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Mosaic developed both the name and the identity for Generations of Hope, a not-for-profit organization dedicated to helping people who want to have a child, but who can’t because of infertility issues, and who can’t afford the high cost of IVF treatment. The name developed from the premise: Everyone deserves the chance, the hope, for a child of their own.
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MommyMode offers resources and networking opportunities for Calgary Moms. So, a simple idea accompanied by the phrase “Moms Helping Moms”.
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Tom Walker is a really great photographer and a great friend of Mosaic. But despite the fact that he had been practicing his craft in Calgary for many, many years, he had no logo or business cards. So we created one for him.
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This series of brand marks are for products and technologies from Sanjel Corporation, one of Canada’s leading oilfield services companies. The challenge here was to maintain a brand and sub-brand family in keeping with Sanjel’s logo and colours while communicating something specific about each product.
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Sometimes it’s fun to play with visual elements that in themselves are nothing new, but to use them in a way that gets the point across. Such is the case for this management consultant company. They wanted to get across the notion that they help companies rise above their competition and improve the “top line” while at the same time suggesting the same for themselves. The word “catalyst” suggested something to do with molecules. So spheres seemed a natural symbol.
