portfolio & design blog of logo & identity designer, Graham Smith

This is Part 1 of the Logo Design Round-Up series. This ongoing series showcases a collection of logos and brand marks, self submitted by a bunch of freelance designers and creative folk in many creative areas. These designers use the logos to sell, promote, brand and market their various skills.
Part 2 will follow soon, you can read Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7, Part 8, Part 9, Part 10, Part 11, Part 12 if you have missed it.
You can see how I designed my own logo in this post : Bastardizing Helvetica for the ImJustCreative Logo Design
If you want to be part of this logo design series, then details can be found at the bottom of this post.
What this collection is not
This is not a competition, it’s not a best of, it’s not a who has the best logo, it’s not a collection of logos that I have chosen. It is simply logos supplied by those that wanted to be part of this post. And a huge thank you to everyone who has submitted. For those of you that have submitted, but your logo is not here, you will be in the next part.
Logo Roundup – Part 1

Krissy Gogel – 6b Design
My goal while designing this logo was to come up with something clean and simple, but not too boring. I wanted the “6b” separate from “Design” so that it could be used by itself. I chose this final design because it looks good on the website as well as on business cards.

Adelle Charles – Fuel Your Creativity
The old logo was nice & simple but wasn’t really an identity (mark). I needed for it to be more versatile which I why I chose to play off the “fuel” and “fire” icon. Something that could stand on it’s own going forward.

Niki Brown – Graphic + Web Designer
I decided to brand myself with a funky typeface called Candy Script. Its playful and bold – just like me. I also decided to add my office mouse illustration into the mix to show off my illustration skills. On my website (http://nikibrown.com) the illustration of the mouse changes from page to page based on the content.

JD Weagley
I chose to design my logo in the way that I did because I wanted it to convey a bit of a message. My main core of business comes from churches and non-profits, the name itself is from Philippians 4:13 (‘I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me’), which is also why I took the silhouette of the mountains and the guy with his arms raised. I felt it showed both strength and praise to God. My font choices were based upon what I felt went together well.

David Millar – Puzzle Creator
I designed it because I was in need of something simple that kind of says “hand-drawn/handmade” and also that you solve the puzzles I make on paper. The pen idea came from when I was just slopping together a logo for an experimental Spanish version of my site for my Spanish class.
The logo was made in Inkscape and looks best on white. On my business cards it’s on a plain white background, but on my site it has a white glow and is over top of a header background

Kenroy George
The requirements set forth for this logo was to utilize the first initials of my first and last name. I wanted something that was simply as possible. It had to be able to work well on both the web and on print. Lastly, I needed a logo that was able to stay relevant 10-20 years from now so there were no particular styles used.
Some personal details were interjected as well. The ‘+’ signifies my neutral position on most things in life. The color pink is a middle finger to gender colorization. I love pink and in no way does that make me “girly”. Ed: Yes it does! ;0)

Arbenting – The act of being Creative
The Arbenting logo came about through a bit of a route. When we first started Arbent.net (the original incarnation of our graphic design business), Arbenting was a blog that was attached later. The blog was another beast altogether, it was something a bit different than the main site, and it was about the process. Hence the act of being creative. Which we felt defined the blog, and also gave us the inspiration for typing the title as if it were an entry in a dictionary.

Jonathan Lackey | vp, creative director
This version is instances where it can bleed off the right side. I use this as labels, letterhead and esignatures.
There is not much to the overall concept behind the logo. The name is my wife’s maiden name and after a year+ brainstorming for the perfect name this hit me. It’s short, memorable and starts with a Z. What more could you ask for. I used simple type treatment to keep an elegant flexible mark.

Angela Ballinger
My thoughts were that I wanted flexibility so that I could change colors and style of other things without completely alienating the brand I’ll be working so hard to create. There was no fancy reasoning behind the design. I wanted to accent the “a” to use on its own, and I liked the tight and semi-symmetrical spacing of the rest. I may or may not use the tag, and I may or may not change the location or font of the tag.

Bruce Colthart – Creative llc
I’ve only recently settled on this monogram for my logo. While not yet fully implemented, it does satisfy my need for something simple (but not too elementary), engaging (but not overly complex), flexible (will accept different treatments and work in different arrangements), highly reproducible (scalable and legible at different sizes, in different media) and reflecting some finesse.
Any text (my business name, etc.) will be set apart from this mark. Because I don’t like or use them close together, there is no permanent relationship between the two. That’s part of this badge’s built-in flexibility.

Ben Barber – Firstbright
The idea originally was for a light bulb to represent the bright ideas part of the brand, but as this was to common so I thought of a shooting star which would naturally replace the dot above the i which I then added to, making the tail go further into the distance to give the logo a modern look with more dimension, so it wasn’t as flat.
The colors chosen are to represent the clean fresh nature of my companies work.

Rajesh Pancholi – r27 creativelab
It’s based on the my initial and DOB. It started out as more of a tag with an interest in graffiti many years ago and developed from there. It’ll keep changing as time goes on, as the studio and career progresses. Saying that its due for a change now, so watch this space…

Khayyam Wakil
It’s a clothing company I’m starting up that will resonate with the cold winters up here in Canada. Everyone would know this kind of apparel as a hooded sweatshirt or hoodie. Where I come from it’s only known as:
I needed a brand that could easily be recognized and easily applied to an embroidered logo, it had to stretch across a myriad of applications. Something cute and not too cute, simple and not too simple… you get the drift. Follow the white rabbit…

Johns Beharry
I got tired of using a name that portrayed me as a company. So these past months I’ve been on a little journey to develop my own style. I wanted to be more personal to show the real me. I think it worked out.

Eli Penner – Sleepy Hero
The brand of my site is pretty much due to the name of the company. I find that names that kind of go against what the site does are usually quite effective at being remembered. Nobody wants to hire a sleepy web designer. I think this logo goes really well with the idea of fun and cute and approachable.
End of Part 1
Difficult to choose which ones to put in when you have no specific criteria to go by, so more of a case of how ever the images popped up in emails and Photoshop. So totally in no particular order.
Part 2 will follow soon, if you want to add your own logo to forthcoming versions of this post, then check out this post ‘I want your creative business logo for forthcoming post‘.
Thanks again to all those that have submitted logos, its been really cool checking them all out and reading the reasons behind them.
Categories: Logo & Brand Identity, Web Development
Tagged: business logos, company logos, creative, logo designer, logo designs < Previous: BackBoard Review – Awesome way to manage logo designs and feedback
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Very nice. My favourites on this list include, Jonathan Lackey | vp, creative director and Kenroy George
Very nice. My favourites on this list include, Jonathan Lackey | vp, creative director and Kenroy George
Thanks for the inclusion. Working on a development at this very moment. Thanks again. R
Thanks for the inclusion. Working on a development at this very moment. Thanks again. R
Very cool. Kenroy George is memorable and creates a unique icon — akin to the Artist Formerly Known as Prince.
Very cool. Kenroy George is memorable and creates a unique icon — akin to the Artist Formerly Known as Prince.
lovely little insight… thanks man
lovely little insight… thanks man
Awesome! Its really cool seeing insight on the logo makers and why they wanted to use them/make them.
Chad Engle´s last blog post..Design Community Twitter Hours
Awesome! Its really cool seeing insight on the logo makers and why they wanted to use them/make them.
Chad Engle´s last blog post..Design Community Twitter Hours
Wonderful collection! It’s great to read the thought process behind the designs. Thanks for putting this together.
Dan Denney´s last blog post..Web Star: Collis Ta’eed and Envato
Wonderful collection! It’s great to read the thought process behind the designs. Thanks for putting this together.
Dan Denney´s last blog post..Web Star: Collis Ta’eed and Envato
Graham:
Nice little collection,and thanks so much for reproducing my monogram here. I too enjoy Kenroy George’s mark, but I also very much like Niki Brown’s mark, for way different reasons; it’s got an approachable personality and warmth.
Graham:
Nice little collection,and thanks so much for reproducing my monogram here. I too enjoy Kenroy George’s mark, but I also very much like Niki Brown’s mark, for way different reasons; it’s got an approachable personality and warmth.
thanks for including my new one Graham! — love-love the Kenroy George logo, very nice :) it’s neat reading the stories behind them as well.. looking forward to the next one!
thanks for including my new one Graham! — love-love the Kenroy George logo, very nice :) it’s neat reading the stories behind them as well.. looking forward to the next one!
nice! keep them coming!!
how about the logo at http://www.netbramha.com
thoughts?
Aashish Solanki´s last blog post..5 Platforms a newbee (or pro) Designer should use to develop sites!
nice! keep them coming!!
how about the logo at http://www.netbramha.com
thoughts?
Aashish Solanki´s last blog post..5 Platforms a newbee (or pro) Designer should use to develop sites!
I feel like some “cursive writing” like font style might have enhanced the Design Styles even better. Just its my view
krishna´s last blog post..Most Popular Searches on Google, Ask, and Yahoo in 2008
I feel like some “cursive writing” like font style might have enhanced the Design Styles even better. Just its my view
krishna´s last blog post..Most Popular Searches on Google, Ask, and Yahoo in 2008
Thanks for the feature man! Some really nice logos there. Always nice to see how other people brand themselves
Thanks for the feature man! Some really nice logos there. Always nice to see how other people brand themselves
i love kenroy george’s logo.
i love kenroy george’s logo.
thanks for the feature mate. nice touch on the edit…and no it does not! :-P
also thanks to Curvball, ATW, Bruce Colthart Creative, and Angela for the love :)
thanks for the feature mate. nice touch on the edit…and no it does not! :-P
also thanks to Curvball, ATW, Bruce Colthart Creative, and Angela for the love :)
Nice post—I like the “Zuno”, it’s my fav.
Nice post—I like the “Zuno”, it’s my fav.
These are great examples. Logo design is creative work that takes a lot of thinking because not only should the design be well thought out and artistic but there should also be a marketing point of view on the design to sell the product well. These are good examples of both of those things. Thanks for sharing.
These are great examples. Logo design is creative work that takes a lot of thinking because not only should the design be well thought out and artistic but there should also be a marketing point of view on the design to sell the product well. These are good examples of both of those things. Thanks for sharing.
Thanks for the inclusion. It’s nice to see designers pushing themselves instead of always pushing others. There’s a lot of love in these designs and a lot of love in this post.
Thanks once again Graham for bringing it ;)
Khayyam Wakil´s last blog post..Tag, you’re it…
Thanks for the inclusion. It’s nice to see designers pushing themselves instead of always pushing others. There’s a lot of love in these designs and a lot of love in this post.
Thanks once again Graham for bringing it ;)
Khayyam Wakil´s last blog post..Tag, you’re it…
These are all extremely well done and just plain creative. Which is your favorite by the way? I was keen on the Kenroy George. Nice work.
Cheers,
These are all extremely well done and just plain creative. Which is your favorite by the way? I was keen on the Kenroy George. Nice work.
Cheers,