Corporate Branding

Client: WheelWork

Mandate: Creation of a brand corporate

KP was mandated to create a brand corporate logo for "Wheel Work", a Swiss christian music & performance group. They expressed desires to have a visual incorporating wheels or cogs to communicate movement with the Ws as big cog teeth. This is an exhibition of the exploration of that general concept to final validations.
Prior to our production, we proposed a series of projects found in the images below with different fonts and design styles. We wanted them to be able to choose a style that more closedly corresponded to what had been described. This established the first draft of ideas and graphic direction for the production. Having the most impact for what the desired, they chose the last version bellow with the wheel that as the "ww" touching.


Client documents

To be as precise as possible, we ask them to prepare examples of what they had in mind.

Sketches and images of wheels they liked were submitted by the client.

We explained, that the actual cog wheels would be a visual illustration we could develop later on in 3D with or without animation but that the cogs did not make a company logo.

Our job was to create a corporate brand logo that could express the essence of these illustrations.

Phase 2 : Main research

We began with the exploration of many different graphic cog wheels first and then different styles of cog wheels working together. Creating a foundation, from there we created 11 variations of concepts expressing the mouvement between the 2 "ww"s.

From that series came the choise, "we want to get away from the roundness, prefer square style, the "ww" need to touch each other, to see a spark with the red on top, black or dark gray bellow.

Phase 3 : no curves

After design phase 2, we went back to create an other series of projects with more lines.

KP proposed more designs with the "2 ww" touching each other with the red on top and with lines to build afterwords a 3D version of the final logo.

The client like the shape of the top "W" of the second project from the left. We work online with quick draft ideas of the changes they wanted to arrive to that version bellow. The client feedback was to play with those 2 drafts and build a mecanism style that could work.

Phase 4 : Research of real world interactivity between the 2 "ww"s

After the phase 3, we went back to create an other series of projects built on a real cog wheel movement.

We took our 2 drafts and reshaped them on the different cog wheel structures. We proposed a new series of a logo based on this concept. We also designed a new font style that was working nicelly with this chosen style.
It was not easy for the client to decide what they wanted. Something was not working for them. When there are too many people to make a decicion, work sometimes is duplicated. So, we took our pencil in front of them and did a quick sketch to confirm thhe direciton. They chose the last version below.

Phase 5 : An other try

Because of the complex level of indecision, we decided to redesign another variation based on theiir previously validated series of projects

Phase 6 : The final version chosen by the client

What we learned in this experiance and ... Our advice to you

In general, It's not an easy process to create a brand corporate logo for a client. It can be a long process especially if many people are involved in a corperate decision. It's also a process that needs everybody involved to be convinced. In this rare situation of indecision between the clients participants, we found in this particulary case, that it would have been helpfull to do sketches from day one. Because everytime there was a validated decision, we took our pencil and start drawing new ideas for the changing direction internally. The client worked allot to find thier own final direction. We are proud of the work done and presented here and we thank our client for this opportunity. However, to be more cost effective, we advice you to choose who has the final authoritiy to take a final decision in your company for this work.
Secondly, to decide beforehand if you want us to create something from sratch with no previous conception with our creatives ideas. The alternative is to give us your concept and design with the new strategy that you want and we will create your brand logo in that concept. We use your vision and images that you like and we create your brand logo with that in mind. In this case, the final version cost twice as much as budgeted due to the indecision of who decides what. Going overbudget is a risk we take when working this way. The conclusion is, "too many chiefs and not enough indians" applies in this exammple in order to have a simple logo without the internal politics or "who decides what". At the end, they have the logo they asked us for and we are happy that it was agreed with all the participants involved.