You did it! You’ve finished the branding or rebranding process and have a name that defines your work. You’ve nailed the key ingredients for a visual identity (logomark, typeface and color palette). Now, you need a few more visual assets to add to your brand’s secret sauce to complement what you’re cooking up. Think: icons, repeat patterns for background texture, color blocks and shapes to layer behind cropped images, photo frames and embellishments.
Just as you might find community with those you share a meal with, consider your brand as your organization’s way of connecting with people. Keep in mind a brand is built on a foundation that stimulates ALL senses – the look, feel, smell, sound and taste your brand evokes. In this blog post, we’ll address the visual aspect of your brand but because a brand is much more than just looks, it’s important to remember to be intentional about ALL the ways someone engages with your entity. Challenges such as the evolution of your organization, budgetary constraints or tight timelines may put elements of your brand on a platter while other parts are simmering on the backburner. When you are forced to work unconventionally, use these tips to create visual condiments for your brand.
Open the Pantry
Don’t be discouraged if you’re working in reverse. There’s still an opportunity to add flavor to your visual assets even if your logo was created without a system in mind. Harness your inner Julia Child and experiment with what you have in the pantry to build a system of cohesive glyphs and marks. Start by taking inventory and compiling the assets you’re working with. Then, have a goal in mind for what you’re trying to achieve. Are your immediate needs to fill a large banner with visual interest? Do you need social graphics for a campaign? Packaging for client gifts?
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Assemble a Creative Canapé
Find inspiration from what you already know and love about your existing brand elements. Explore a new approach and lean into the abstract. Slice and dice your current mark to ignite creative possibilities. You’ll be cooking with fire in no time!
- Stand back from your logo and blur your vision. Does a different or unexpected shape come to the forefront?
- Manipulate your mark by rotating, scaling, merging, and/or duplicating for texture, pattern and deeper dimension.
- Pull out the negative space to create new forms. If you are using a specific typeface in your brand, experiment with the letterforms in your wordmark.
- What is the meaning behind your logo? Introduce additional icons or visual elements that carry those same connotations.
Ensure that the fruits of this exercise give you (and your audiences) the same feeling as your original logomark. Is your brand a warm, comforting bowl of soup? Or does it elicit feelings of zesty adventure?
Sauté Your Ideas and Put Them to Work
Bonus points if you freehanded the above exercise. Now, take a photo of your experimentation and pull your drawing into the computer. Our team works in Adobe Creative Suite, Figma and Canva, among other platforms and as of the date of this post, you can set up a free account for Figma or Canva and begin your digital illustration journey. Create a vector graphic by tracing over your image and further your work by using the shapes you created to:
- Add a stroke to the shape, make the fill transparent, and use as a frame for pull quotes
- Crop images
- Layer different colored shapes of varying sizes, orientations and transparency
Serve it Up!
Whether using your new assets on your website, in print or on social media, be sure the visual brand elements remain connected to your organization’s purpose, mission and values. If you are eating a slice of humble pie after reading this post, don’t fret. View our portfolio to see how our team takes a holistic approach to helping organizations build messaging platforms, design visual identities and develop accessible websites from start to finish.
Illustrated and Animated by Annabelle Gallegos, Design Associate at Barefoot PR
Written by Tara Riseley, Senior Design Specialist at Barefoot PR