For this project, our job was to choose a city to rebrand and create a multichannel campaign to advertise said city to tourists. I chose Pensacola, a west coast city in Florida known for its white beaches and clear waters. I wanted to make a brand that really captured the vibes of Pensacola and a logo that was fun and clever.
Research & Discovery
Located in Florida’s panhandle, Pensacola is surrounded by 50-plus miles of coastline which includes the emerald-green Gulf of Mexico waters and crystal clear bay areas. This makes Pensacola the perfect combination of a relaxed beach town and bustling metropolitan center. The temperate, climate and a friendly community that is driven toward success present an unparalleled quality of life.
Creative Brief
My main goals for this assignment was to make my city branding fun, inviting, and show that Pensacola is the perfect spot for tourists to visit if they're looking to relax.
Brainstorming
Mood Boards
For this assignment I decided to explore three activities and vibes when visiting Pensacola. Each mood board includes an explanation as to what that specific style emphasizes.
Type Exploration
During this step, I found it important to cover a lot of different styles, from clean and bold to more funky and brush types. Type is always one of the best ways I find inspiration and come up with so many different ideas.
Concept Development
For my sketches, I found it incredibly important to try and come up with a lot of unique ideas, wanting to cover all my bases. I ended up creating a handful of concepts based on each mood board. Shoreline is more outdoorsy with the classic beach-y theme, ocean, and the sun primary elements. The boardwalk designs are more unique and exploratory. And the market designs were much more structured and polished than the rest.
Digital Drafts
Getting into official digital drafts, with feedback from peers, I chose eight concepts to make into digital drafts. I also went ahead and explored different type options to go along with them.
Digital Drafts 2
I tried not to be too biased, but this shark/fish element was always a favorite of mine, and it worked so well as a lettermark that I couldn't help but choose it to move forward with as part of my final logo. I experimented with a lot of different type options, but in the end enjoyed the wave-like feel on the right draft more. After this, I tweaked the main letter mark a little bit more, wanting to make it more fish-like rather than looking like a killer whale.
Final Designs
Color Exploration
Icon Development
For this project, we also had to come up with a set of symbols for signage. The goal was to create illustrations that could be understood by anyone, no matter the language barrier. The symbols I felt were most important for tourists were, historical landmark, dining, market, beach, and lodging.
Mockup Sketches
For my mockups, I needed a lot of different assets for my branding campaign. Below you can see my original sketches for a poster, banner, billboard, website homepage, signage, and merchandise.
Mockups
Reflection
This project is absolutely one of my favorites and I feel like I gained a lot of useful design knowledge throughout the process. I got to design a homepage for the first time, allowing me to learn a new design tool (Figma), as well as learn the basics about accessibility on web and having to deal with proper contrasts and usability constraints. Overall this was one of my favorite projects, the logo is one of my favorites I've made! I feel that I was successful in creating a brand that reflected Pensacola perfectly, and achieved keeping it cohesive throughout all the different deliverables.