Freelance Work | Graphic Designer
About The Client
Based in Tampa, Florida, two incredible professional Latin dancers begin their greatest journey yet.
My clients are two professional dancers/dance partners ready to establish themselves as professionals, teachers, and choreographers for their own salsa team and dance studio. Jessica Montavlo and Christian Cartagena are the next big thing to hit the salsa dance scene. They are now ready to launch their new business adventure. Their first step beginning with branding and logo design.
Challenge
With many dance companies around the world it is hard to stand out.
How can I create a brand and logo that the clients can identity with?
Jessica and Christian were able to find their name (Made For Me.) but needed to find the right logo and branding to feel the sense of confidence in their business that they feel performing on stage. They wanted a logo that showed their multi-talented dance skills, their personalities, and their business values.
My Role
As a graphic designer it was my responsibility to meet these goals and deliver the following:
• Develop a branding guideline/kit
• Create a primary logo
• Create a logo that will be used for not only marketing but also apparel
• Develop mutual understanding for client's design needs and goals
• Research competitors through independent audit
• Collaborate with client through multiple online meetings
• Utilize client feedback to move forward towards our end product
• Deliver the digital products my clients need to succeed as a new dance company
Learn more about the process below
Audit Research
My research included dance companies, partners, and teams from small to large companies. In addition, I researched how dance companies were utilizing their logo in marketing materials like flyers and social media content. This helped me in understanding what my clients needed to successfully market themselves on social media and any format of publication.
Researching dance companies within the same genre of dance (salsa) and other styles to see how that affected design choices made for their branding and logo designs. I researched dancer teams, choreographers, and performers in different genres such as: hiphop, bachata, ballet, and more. This helped create a better understanding of what my clients needed.
Conclusion of Findings
Salsa Teams/Dance Companies:
The branding and logos had very similar traits in design choices like: simple, bold, delicate, or too many details. They also had a lot of similarity with limited color palette flexibility. My clients were specifically interested in multiple color flexibility therefore, a limited color palette was not going to work for their design.
Other Teams/Dance Companies:
The branding and logos had very contrasting approaches to their branding and logo design. The designs were either minimal or very complex. This gave me an understanding that genre did not influence the type choice, color schemes, or branding choices.
Conclusion:
After completing this research I developed a better understanding of the logo and branding guidelines my clients needed to have for marketing materials, social media, apparel, and successful visibility.
Examples of logos found in the Latin dance community
Logos incorporated in event signage/flyers/marketing materials
Other dance genres | Logos and marks
Sketchs and Ideations
First Concepts
Created with secondary logo options for flexibility and variety.
Presented with color palette potential choices and how they would interact with both contrasting backgrounds.
Idea 1
Idea 1 Color
Idea 2
Idea 2 Color
Secondary Logo Achieved
Discovering this mark was possible after multiple iterations however this logo felt unfinished and needed to be considered potentially as a secondary logo. It was not achieving the goal of multi-color incorporating that my clients were looking for therefore, the design process needed to continue.
Color Exploration | Potential Solution
This was a potential solution but I felt that I could push for more. Something that allowed my clients to use this mark and something similar in addition.
Final Delivery | All Logo Marks
Additional Project with Client
Her Intuition
Separate logo and branding for single use performance
This project was completed simultaneously with Made For Me Dance Company.
The client needed this to reach a performance deadline and was completed prior to Made For Me Dance Company.
Branding Guide
Mockup Apparel
Mockup Apparel
Social Media Content
