I recently wrote a case study about brand communication with typography as part of my degree. Rather than hand it in as a boring straight off word print out I decided to produce and bind my own little A5 book. Here is the case study, enjoy!

Branding. Everywhere we look, every minute of the day something or someone is displaying their own brand and identity. To me the word brand or branding is sometimes misused to describe just a logo but a brand is much more than this. Getting a company/product brand right from the start can set the tone for everything else the company/ product ever does and represents. Branding requires in-depth analysis in the appropriate customer profiles in order to reach out to the correct target market. However a brand isn’t just a logo; the brand is created by exemplary customer service, interesting and useful products which the visual design then wraps around.

Wim Crouwel is highly regarded for his branding and typography work as well as being an all round designer. One thing that plays a vital part in his branding work is the use of semiotics. Semiotics are the “science of meaning” and they help us in our understanding of how situations can change in relation to signs and symbols as a combined powerhouse. Wim’s branding is very much to my taste and due to the fact that all his logo’s work as solid reversible colours allowing them to be adjusted to work on any media surface, they feature bold visual shapes and his use strong application of typography. I feel that branding can work even better when visually strong typography is used with the correct kerning and tracking. Semiotics though doesn’t just have to be an element in a logo though; it can range from signs, symbols, and images. Recently HMS Belfast, as WWII ship was airbrushed out of an Olympic heritage campaign as the designer thought the semiotic of a battle ship set the wrong tone. The missing semiotic however was quickly added back into the campaign due to public uproar. An example of disruptive advertising or a foolish mistake?

In contemporary times to Wim Crouwel, Why Not Associates are a modern graphic design agency specialising in typography and brand design along with many other disciplines for over two decades. They are an agency that I have took great inspiration from since I started my design education in 2008, always breaking boundaries their work is bold and interesting but at the same time communicative.  The work in their portfolio is very sophisticated and solves their client’s communication problems. A recent branding & type project of theirs, which was in collaboration with Gordon Young who is a “visual artist who focuses on creating art for the public domain”, was called “Comedy Carpet”. The permanent Blackpool marble carpet is an outdoor installation featuring typographic quotes and articles from over 1,000 comedians and writers. What really impressed me is the sheer scale for a flat outdoor installation. It combines beautiful block type all of which has been carefully tailored to express the quotes in the correct manner rather than using standard fonts which wouldn’t of matched the words they are representing. As a piece of community/landscape brand design I think it’s very successful, not only has it had an impact on the landscape but it has an emotional connection with the Blackpool public who will group together and wander around the work reading the quotes and stories creating a sense of community. I strongly believe if the work you create can positively draw people in and lead them on a rememberable journey then it is design that could possibly last a lifetime and leave behind a positive impact.

Combing a brand identity with print collateral can sometimes be over worked and lead to a poor outputted result which can really let down the projected image of a company. One thing that Why Not are extremely good at is combing branding with corporate print and I have always drawn from their minimalistic design approach in my own branding work. A company called ENVY which is a post production company have ultra modern offices across London. Looking at the print and identity created for them I can clearly see how the brand flows to tie in with their image as a business. Their sleek minimal composition matches their studio spaces and the use of neutral colours with a hint of charcoal black compliments each other across the range of video sleeves, cd covers, tapes and stationary. Looking at the logo DNA we can see its four letters, stacked on top of each other with a deconstructed letter E. The definition of the word envy is, “Desire to have a quality, possession or other attribute belonging to someone else” and the typographic layout and style completely communications this desire as the business wants people to desire the work produced by the brand and that ENVY is a high quality and professional company to work with.

Looking at modern day debates about branding design, The Design Museum shop, London has seen many rebrands over the years and the latest one by Spin has sparked an online debate on sites such as Creative Review about whether minimal brand design is acceptable and if it show the skills of a good designer. I personally believe that simple is best and if artwork is over complicated it can lose the message that is being communicated. The new design features the current museum logotype but with the words “+ Shop” added underneath it. The new brand identity has also metaphorically adopted a sister which is simply a coloured straight line which features on all the print work and shop displays. The thinking behind this singular line according to Spin is that, “The line symbolises the first mark made in the creation of any design and shows how design is at the core of everything the museum touches. Each piece produced has its own design and production story.” I would firmly agree with this point because design has to start somewhere and the brand has been designed to initiate the design catalyst and then you use the museum and shop to explore the design route through the artwork on display. Comments that have been made about the new branding such as, “I love Spin but this is taking simplicity to the it’s absolute limit. It’s the sort of work that gives designers a bad name in the public domain.” I think one of the hardest things to do as a designer is selling negative space and minimalist design to the client. I think when it comes to branding clients generally feel that they want to get value for money by having more which is understandable from their perspective, but would it then communicate its message and “glow” their brand values? I think Spin have been very successful in being able to convince the client to apply negative space and minimalist typography and design which has produced a good overall design.

Branding is everywhere today. Digital agencies are continuing to find ways to stream marketing directly to us whether it be digitally via, smart phones or on interactive printed bill boards. It is estimated that the average Briton “receives over 3,000 advertising message a day” (BBC Online) – all with brands attached wanting us to buy into their product or services. I do agree that sometimes it would be nice to strip back all the branding to see what the world would be like. However, I feel that we do need branding in order to aid communication. Branding isn’t just about corporate identities because combing it with the study of semiotics it can be used across a range of communications from warning signs, road signs, cattle marks and tattoos to name a few. One argument that I hear often is that we are exposed to too much consumer branding as a society. In simpler past times having a stable (sometimes wealthy and powerful) family was good enough to create our social identity and encourage us to pave our way through society to build our lives. Now we live in a society where we crave brands and go to extreme lengths to keep up with the latest releases and follow our peers to keep within the inner circle. This point is illustrated by Neil Boorman, who is the author of “Bonfire of the brands”. He says, “The manner in which we spend our money defines who we are. This theory isn’t exactly new. Thorstein Veblen conjured the phrase “conspicuous consumption” back in 1899 in his book the Theory of the Leisure Class. In this secular society of ours, where family and church once gave us a sense of belonging, identity and meaning, there is now Apple, Mercedes and Coke.” Boorman has also experimented by burning all of his personal items that are branded to try and find, as he describes “real happiness…find the real me”, some would say it would be impossible to find something that isn’t branded but Boorman is taking the approach of consuming to need rather than consuming to want. I personally don’t think the majority of society could truly adopt the approach of consuming to need due to the amount of marketing media we are exposed to in the 21st century. Branding can be very powerful and organisations have taken advantage of this over the years and applied it in an unethical way. However if the power of brand design is used in the correct way it can be of great benefit to us in our everyday lives. Therefore I feel that this is why branding is important.