City Fruit Rebranding: Logo Redesign

OVERVIEW

Design Question

How can the branding of City Fruit, an organization in Seattle that aims to cultivate urban fruit and build community, be improved?

Solution

I redesigned City Fruit’s logo to better convey the organization’s goals.

Project Details

Duration: 1 week in Winter 2019
My Role: Visual Designer
Tools: Adobe Illustrator

CITY FRUIT BACKGROUND

City Fruit’s mission is to “City Fruit promotes the cultivation of urban fruit in order to nourish people, build community, and protect the climate” (cityfruit.org). The audiences for this website are fruit tree owners in Seattle and people in the Seattle Community interested in harvesting, protecting, and preserving fruits.

City Fruit’s goals:

Goal 1

Protect, harvest, and improve the care of fruit trees

Goal 2

Build a sense of community with their constituents and maintain a long-lasting relationship

Goal 3

Educate the community, while caring for trees

Goal 4

Encourage other community members to join their mission

LOGO REDESIGN

Through the logo redesign, I wanted to convey City Fruit’s location (Seattle) and purpose (harvesting fruit trees).

Analysis of Current Logo

Current City Fruit Logo

This is an unsuccessful logo for the following reasons:

  • The color of the apple looks uninviting

  • There is no space between the apple and the text, making it crowded

  • It does not convey anything about what the organization does

Initial Sketches

I started off the redesign process by sketching ideas I had for the logo, which helped boost my creativity and gave me a starting point to develop my designs.

Initial Logo Ideas

Design Drafts

I created a black and white draft for the three ideas I picked to present at a critique session. They are black and white because I wanted to focus on conveying the message through the form of the logo. I also resized the logo into different sizes to see how they would look in various situations such as different screen sizes and marketing materials.

1st Logo Draft Idea

The positive of this design is that it emphasizes apples and trees, which conveys the location and the purpose of City Fruit. The font also looks friendly and inviting. However, the tree could be nicer and placed farther from the name of the organization to reduce clutter.

2nd Logo Draft Idea

The positive of this design is that it emphasizes apples and it shows Seattle as the location much more strongly than the rest of the designs through the inclusion of the Space Needle. However, the font is not very friendly.

3rd Logo Draft Idea

The positive of this design is that it emphasizes apples. However, it does not convey the purpose of harvesting trees through the logo.

Final Design

Based on the feedback I received, the second design was the most playful and had greater potential to become a more apt logo for City Fruit. I decided to expand on this logo, but incorporate the Space Needle from the third design since that received positive feedback.

 

Final Logo Design

 

Through this logo, I wanted to convey City Fruit’s location and focus on fruit trees. To accomplish this, I used:

  • Fusion with the Space Needle as an “I” because City Fruit is based in Seattle and an apple for the other “I” because apples are Washington State’s main fruit.

  • Separation with the tree on the side and above the apple to make it look like the apple fell from the tree and is ready to be harvested. This creates a sense of nature in an urban setting

  • Green hues to further emphasize the feeling of greenery and nature

The main critique I received for this design is that the tree could have been moved a little bit towards the right to create a more spacious feel. I would also like to make the tree leaves and the Space Needle look neater for a future iteration of this design.

REFLECTION

This was my first visual design project, and I learned a lot about logo design. Throughout this process, I saw other people’s logo redesigns, which helped me gain inspiration to expand on my own ideas. I also learned how to use the basic features of Adobe Illustrator through this project.

Next Steps

To continue re-branding City Fruit, I want to create some icon ideas to help me improve my visual communication skills.

Key Takeaways

Here are some key takeaways I got from working on this project:

  1. Be able to explain design choices: During critique sessions, I sometimes found it hard to articulate my ideas, but when I did, the feedback was more specific and helpful.

  2. Be comfortable with getting critique: Sometimes it was hard to listen to people question my design, but using critique was critical to improving as a designer.

  3. Sketching ideas is a great way to get started: It was helpful to explore multiple ideas quickly before spending a lot of time making designs on Illustrator. It also motivated me to consider multiple ideas before settling on a few to explore further.

I will incorporate what I learned from this project into my future projects!