PROJECT: BRAND IDENTITY
CLIENT: BRAND NEW STORY

Brand New Story is a brand storytelling and communications business, owned by writer, Rachel Savage.

Rachel runs brand storytelling courses to help businesses create inspiring brands that speak from the heart. In addition to the courses, she also uses her writing and comms skills to help the businesses she works with to communicate more clearly.

OBJECTIVE

The business had previously been operating under another name, and was rebranding as Brand New Story. I was approached to create a new identity, which would be used initially on business cards and the website, and later be rolled out to include course materials etc.

The concept of the identity is based around the idea of speaking from the heart, and the sorts of ideas, words and phrases that are integral when developing a business's Brand New Story. 

I developed the idea of a heart-shaped speech bubble and wanted it to be filled with hand drawn typography. The words inside the heart relate very strongly to what Brand New Story stand for, and the ideas they try to instil in the businesses they work with.

The images above show my process from initial pencil sketch to the finished brand mark. I created the typography by hand as it felt more authentic and personal, which was particularly appropriate for this project and client. Once I'd completed the final hand-drawn version, I scanned it in and converted it to vector artwork, for some fine tuning and a few tweaks here and there. You can see in my initial stages I tried to interconnect some of the words (Storytelling and Voice) - However, I found the words didn't stand out quite so well at smaller sizes and became a little confused, so I opted to separate them.

Throughout the process, I was mindful that the identity shouldn't feel too 'girly', which can often become the case when hearts are involved. For this reason I chose a bold, hand-painted style for the logotype and yellow as the main brand colour, with it's warmth, positivity and to evoke the sense of a sunrise, the dawning of something new...

When used alongside the Brand New Story logotype, the typography within the heart becomes a secondary element or texture, so as not to over-shadow the main logo text.

A colour palette and specified brand fonts were supplied, for use across all brand materials and the website.

CLIENT PERSPECTIVE

Once the project was complete, I got in touch with Rachel to ask for some feedback. I'm always interested to hear why clients choose to work with me, how they find the process and whether they're happy with the end results - This is what she had to say...

Had you looked at other creatives who may have been able to deliver this work, and if so, why did you decide to work with Carys?

I wanted to work with someone who shared my values and understood my business. My first meeting with Carys showed me that she got it straight away and even before that her website told me that she shared my values too.

How did you find the process… from the initial briefing through to the completion of the project, were there any areas that could be improved?

I found the process straightforward and well communicated.

We did have one hiccup where I wasn’t sure about the ideas that were coming back to me. But this sparked a frank conversation that resulted in us nailing the creativity and everything sprang from there. The creative process, by its very nature, tends to pull up ‘what you don’t want’ in order to get ‘what you do want’. Carys knows this and holds this space really well.

(I have a little response to this comment at the end!)

What solutions has Carys provided for you and are you happy with the results?

I have a logo that I absolutely love and business cards I’m only too proud to hand out. I’m utterly thrilled with the results. My new logo definitely has the wow factor. After my first networking event with my new business card I received an email from someone that said "you get the prize for best business card of the day!".

If you had to describe Carys to another business owner what would you say?

Carys is an amazing designer. She’s friendly, professional and a brilliantly creative thinker. 

I hand on heart can recommend working with Carys. (In fact, one of my friends is already interested in Carys for his up and coming rebrand – watch this space).

Rachel Savage | Founder of Brand New Story

It's interesting that Rachel mentioned a 'hiccup' in the process. I could have edited that out of her answers, but I think it was a fair point, and important to show how projects can evolve...

Basically at the initial design stage we had agreed that I would show initial pencil sketches, before fully realising an initial logo design. Rachel felt, and in retrospect I can agree with her, that the ideas I'd started with weren't quite right. We talked on the phone, and from listening to what Rachel wanted to achieve I was able to suggest an alternative route we could follow. I worked up some mood boards and initial roughs to demonstrate my thinking, before finalising the designs. I can honestly say that the strength of the resolved identity came about as a direct result of being a little 'off-track' at the outset. It was just a case of honing the initial thoughts, taking a different direction and having the confidence to work through that - the confidence on my part to take a step back and re-assess the concept, and on the client's part to allow me the time and trust to take the project in a new direction.

If you're interested in learning a little more about my process, I have recently written a blog post about just that...! Read on here >

What's It Like To Work With Me? - A Guide to the Process Stages of Your Design or Illustration Project

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