ADG Logo Review

Yeeeeehaw! It’s time for another Logo Roundup—this is the not-really-annual rip-roaring review of our latest logo designs and brand development work. It’s always fun to step back and look at the logos we have cranked out for various clients. It helps us reflect on how we have grown as designers and brand strategists (because we never stop learning.) It also helps our friends, fans and followers to peek behind the curtain and learn a bit about our process. When the process works, everyone wins. Our clients grow their biz. And we have fun using our skills to earn a living doing what we love.

Here are all of the logos we have created since our last logo review (in no particular order.)

Anderson Design Group:
Creating a logo for yourself is the hardest thing anyone can do. This logo has been in use for several years, and we never thought to include it in our logo reviews. Note the A in the center with the D radiating out, and the G at the perimeter holding it all together. While we love our ADG mark, we have never been quite satisfied with how the Anderson Design Group text is integrated with the mark. Here are a few ways we have combined the text and the icon. We are still looking for a perfect solution, by the way! Designer: Joel Anderson

Music City Eats:
We created a brand mark for a wine and food festival that will be in Nashville this fall. Our task was to create an identity for the festival that would present Nashville to the whole culinary and wine world and welcome them to our awesome city. Note the guitar/fork icon. We cannot say more about the festival until the web site is officially launched later in May, but it’s going to be great! Designer: Ligia Teodosiu

Fat Bottom Brewing:
East Nashville is one of the coolest things about Music City. This hip and trend-setting part of our town is full of artisans, chefs, brewers, and visionaries who are making national news with their high-quality and original products. Fat Bottom Brewing is a fine example—owner Ben Bredesen asked us to create a brand identity inspired by World War II era pin up girls—each flavor named for a woman with a similar personality and profile. Designers: Joel Anderson, Andy Gregg & Ligia Teodosiu

Dane Fitness:
This company has been selling and servicing new and used fitness equipment for 10 years. They admitted that their old logo looked more like a plucked chicken than a Viking. So our job was to create an updated brand mark that would set the tone for the next decade to come. Designers: Edward Patton & Aaron Johnson

High Brow Brew:
The owners of a new hip and trendy coffee and tea shop in Franklin Tennessee hired us to create their brand identity. The logo was made to look like a black chalkboard cafe menu with white writing on it. It was refreshing to create a logo in black and white, and to leave it at that. (Sometimes, deciding on a color palette can be the hardest part!) Designer: Ligia Teodosiu

1608:
A British entertainment finance company hired us to help them create an iconic logo that would be creative (they work with major touring performers) and established (they responsively and discreetly handle large sums of money.) So we created a strong Art Deco brand mark that does not feel too stuffy and corporate. Designer: Aaron Johnson

Hair Mama Jones:
A local hair stylist wanted to open a new salon. So we set to work creating a logo that matched her look and style. It started with a great name, and evolved into a hip, edgy tattoo-inspired logo. Designer: Ligia Teodosiu

Legato Gelato:
We love gelato. So when we were hired to create a logo for a new gelato shop, we told the client that we needed to eat a lot of gelato to get our minds around the brand concept. Our client obliged, and we created a brand identity that looks like the gelato tastes—Italian, smooth, sophisticated, and yummy! The colors were inspired by our favorite flavors and ingredients.  Designer: Edward Patton

Music City Pizza:
A new Pizza Restaurant is opening in Nashville next to a favorite music venue. The club and the pizza joint will be all about music and fabulous pizza. We created a logo that hints at the experience of live indie music (the guitar pick shape) with great pizza served in a hip, energetic club atmosphere. Designer: Ligia Teodosiu

Willa’s Shortbread:
This Southern shortbread cookie maker has been in business for a long time. But they needed to retool their brand to get back to their roots of artisan-crafted, small batch, locally-made all-natural goodness—like Mama used to make. So we threw out their slick & polished-looking graphics and created new art in the style from the era when the company was founded. Designer: Ligia Teodosiu

Miracle Hockey:
A local sporting goods store owner hired us to create a logo for his store. His claim to fame is his little son, who has had over a million hits on YouTube re-enacting the sports caster commentary of the historic Miracle on Ice Olympic hockey game between the USA and the Soviet Union. Our task was to create a logo that looked like a sporting goods store inspired by that historic event. We watched the YouTube video, the movie, and lots of hockey to get our minds right. Designer: Edward Patton

Sugar & Snow Gelato:
Once we created the logo for Legato gelato, the word was out that we knew how to create great brand identities for small, gourmet gelato shops. The owner of this establishment from Asheville, NC could not send us samples to eat, (but once you’ve had great gelato, you never forget it.) Those flavor memories made their way into this logo, for sure. Designer: Ligia Teodosiu

Rahal Farms:
Organic, family-owned farms are beautiful operations—the branding needs to reflect the operation, values and mission of the enterprise. We set out to create a logo and brand identity that would be personally connected to the owner, the animals, and the land. The resulting logo and brand identity was a true reflection of owner Michael Rahal and his vision for sustainable farming. Designer: Ligia Teodosiu

True South Puzzle Co.
An artisan puzzle company based in Nashville hired us to create a logo and the packaging for a line of puzzles that feature designs by lesser-known regional artists. Our logo and packaging design will help the company launch their new line of puzzles this summer. Designer: Ligia Teodosiu

ADG print series logos:
We are always creating new collections of poster art that we sell on our site and license to companies from all over the world. Each of our collections has a distinct brand look, and each line needs to have a logo that sets it apart from our other poster art collections. Here are a few of our print collection logos—some of which will be up on our site next month! Designer: Joel Anderson

Al Dente Catering:
A Nashville-based chef who owns a catering and packaged food biz asked us to help him create a new brand identity to emphasize his creative Mediterranean culinary approach. All of his food is made with fresh, all natural and organic ingredients.We kicked off the process by eating a lunch that he catered for our office. That made it a LOT easier to create a logo that would tell his story on menus, biz cards, and on the sides of delivery trucks. Designer: Ligia Teodosiu

Dan’s Gourmet:
Our client had an amazing concept—grown up mac and cheese. (This stuff is seriously gourmet-licious!) We retooled an old logo that Dan had created to sell his food at local farmer’s markets. Soon, the secret was out, and Dan had orders from some major accounts to start selling his frozen packages in grocery stores. Designer: Joel Anderson

The Pharmacy Restaurant:
An East Nashville restauranteur renovated an old pharmacy building to create a fabulous burger and beer garden. We had fun researching turn-of-the-century hand lettering and design to create this logo. No fonts were used to create this logo—all the letters were hand rendered from scratch! Designers: Andy Gregg & Joel Anderson

Saint Joseph of Arimathea:
A local Episcopal church asked us to help them update their branding. They needed one simple brand mark for signs, web sites and stationery, and another decorative seal that was more elaborate and detailed. We learn something new every time we engage with a client. Here is an interesting theological side note: the Greek word Logos means Word—it is used to identify Jesus in the gospel of John1:1, 4... “In the beginning was the Word [Logos], and the Word was with God, and the Word was God... In Him was life, and the life was the light of men.”) Designer: Ligia Teodosiu

The Cicadas Are Coming!

In a few weeks, the East Coast of the USA will experience a natural phenomenon that only occurs once every 17 years—a mass emergence of billions of cicadas whose only purpose will be to tunnel out of the dirt where they have lived for 17 years to indulge in a short-lived “coming out” party. Emerging from their shells en masse, they will unfurl their wings, start making LOTS of noise, find a mate, lay some eggs, and then die.

As graphic designers, our job is to observe popular culture and the world around us, so we can speak visually in relevant ways. We communicate on an emotional level—creating eye-catching ways to promote an idea, a message, a service or a product. When we are not developing logos or designing packaging for our clients, we like to use our artistic talents for fun. And what could be more fun than heralding the most spectacular natural freak show most people will ever experience?

It happened to us 2 years ago in Nashville, Tennessee. A variety of 13-year cicadas emerged and invaded our region for a few very strange weeks, and it was just about the only thing anyone was talking about. We created and sold posters, postcards, ear plugs, coffee mugs, t-shirts and bobble heads to serve as souvenirs and keepsakes of this magically bizarre event. We tapped into the conversation of the moment—a feeling shared by more than a million fellow citizens in our area. And folks just ate it up. People bought our prints and gifts for themselves, or for folks who loved cicadas, and for those who were so disgusted or terrified that they refused to go out doors for days on end. We sold out of everything in a few weeks (thank goodness!)

After seeing how much fun everyone had with these history-marking prints and novelties, we decided to retool all of our art so that our neighbors to the North could have some fun, too.

We have created an entire line of Brood II Cicada Invasion Survival Gear for our pals up north...
Check it out at: www.CicadaInvasion.com


FOR MORE INFORMATION ABOUT CICADAS, VISIT THESE SITES:
http://www.magicicada.org/about/brood_pages/broodII.php

http://washington.cbslocal.com/2013/03/21/cicadas-to-invade-the-area-this-springsummer/

http://www.cicadamania.com/

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2013/03/130329-cicadas-coming-sky-locust-swarm-animal-science/

The Cool: Matthew DiVito Animated Gifs

To check out more animated gifs from Matthew DiVito visit his website here: Link

Lane Motor Museum Poster

When we got a call from Lane Motor Museum asking if we could do a Spirit of Nashville poster we jumped at the chance. Being a fan of all things vintage we took a field trip down to the museum, cameras in hand.

Established in 2002 by Jeff Lane, the museum started with his personal collection of cars that he had bought and restored. Finding a swag location in the former Sunbeam Bakery at 702 Murfreesboro Pike, Lane Motor Museum unveiled it's collection to the public in 2003. One of the few museums specializing in European cars, Lane maintains all it's vehicles in running order. Great care is made to restore each vehicle to near-original specification. With 40,000 square feet and full of cars, there's a lot of history to be seen.

Illustrator Aaron Johnson drew inspiration from the style of old Monaco racing posters, many of which hang in Lane Motor Museum.

Aaron drew some dynamic scenes with cars from the museum. He started with rough concept sketches that we presented to the client with 3 different options for layout, cars, and style.

After settling on a single concept, we presented them three more options for typography and borders.

With the borders and typography figured out, we went back to the museum to shoot specific reference photos to get the right perspective and accurate details on the cars.

Aaron then set out to render the poster in all it's glory, starting with the cars and working outward.

After all the handrendered type was done and all the elements were in place it was just a matter of finding the color scheme that fit the best and represented the cars well.

Now Lane has a new piece of chrome to show off in their museum, and we have a new car poster to add some bling to our Spirit of Nashville poster collection!

This print will be for sale in Lane Motor Museum’s gift shop in a few weeks. Meanwhile, you can see the print and framing optons at our Spirit of Nashville site.

New Dr. Pepper Hour Poster

A few months ago we were approached by Baylor University to create a poster to promote their Dr. Pepper Hour; an event that has taken place on campus each academic week for the past 60 years! What started as an informal gathering of students and teachers in 1953 has become a longstanding tradition. Dr. Pepper Hour, formerly known as Coke Hour, is held every Tuesday between 3pm and 4pm. Students, faculty, and staff come together and socialize while enjoying a refreshing Dr. Pepper float. 

To commemorate the early beginnings of this special tradition, we knew we wanted to create something that felt appropriate for that time period. Yea, you guessed it, we went retro 50's! As usual, we started out sketching until we came up with three ideas that felt retro, light-hearted and whimsical (what's more fun than Dr. Pepper floats, right?)

Once the client picked a favorite, we created final art. Taking cues from old matchbook illustrations, we created a design that would work well in a limited color palette and simple shapes. After we finished the art, we used a little photoshop magic to give it a rough, screen-printed look. The final design was printed at 20x15.