Project Details
Duration: 1 month
My role: Graphic designer
Tools: Adobe Illustrator
Client: CSUMB Institute for Inovation and Economic Development
This was a graphic design project I worked on for my class “CST 406: Graphic Identity” at CSUMB, which was commissioned by CSUMB’s Institute for Innovation and Economic Development (iiED). The project consisted of designing a new logo for the institute (within CSUMB’s brand guidelines) and create branded materials with that logo.
Morphological Matrix
I ended up going with the “3 pillars” design direction. When the director for the program came to class, she emphasized that the three “stool legs” of the program are entrepreneurship, student career prep, and innovation labs. This direction reflects all 3 stool legs/pillars as icons.
Sketches
Further development of the “3 pillars” concept.
Logo Iterations
3 logo options. I used CSUMB’s brand colors and the Montserrat Bold and Monstserrat SemiBold typefaces also from CSUMB’s branding.
Logo I ended up going with:
Final Logo
The marketing coordinator for the iiED program came to class and gave everyone feedback. Her main feedback for me was that the text needed to be scaled up a bit to match the size of the icons.
Print Materials
Digital Materials
Reflection
- Design rationale/thinking:
- I chose to have simple vectors in the logo that could easily be converted into repeatable icons across all marketing materials
- I found that trying to condense all 3 pillars of the program into one graphic to represent them all was going to be too difficult and might skew towards one aspect of the program while ignoring the rest
- I chose icons which could communicate their meaning without even needing the text to accompany it
- The 3 primary colors were integrated into the branding materials almost like a rainbow, which I felt was natural since a rainbow can represent optimism for a better future