Stowe Framework: Identity

Development posts

Name

Stowe Framework developed from a project in the Studio & Entrepreneurship module of this course and was originally conceived as a typeface design project to embody the area of Walthamstow. 

Stowe derives from Old/Middle English as a word to describe a holy or meeting place, and ‘stow’ appears in ‘Walthamstow’. As the location is known as a welcoming place, it is suitable to retain this part of the name to ground the project, whilst removing it from the locale enough to make it applicable in other areas in the future.

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Typeface

I am using the typefaces Archia (san serif) and Calendas (serif) from the Atipo Foundry – I like pairing the typefaces from the same foundry as it gives a more cohesive feel. Both have a few different styles in the font families, but not so many to be overwhelming. Calendas Plus is a serif font with a pleasing stroke contrast and is suitable for long stretches of text. It also has some interesting discretionary ligatures as extra glyphs (see the as and us above) that give it a special feel without being too distracting for the reader.

Archia has a modern geometric feel that contrasts to the traditional feel of Calendas. The ‘a’ has a single storey, like Calendas, and some letters like the lowercase ‘l’ have slab serifs to make reading easier. The descender of the ‘g’ has a flattened base, and the ampersand has a flattened top loop, which gives it some distinction. It can be used for very heavy text, for captions in small sizes, or in lightweight spaced capitals for headings.

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Palette

The colour theme uses a two-colour palette of black and neon red (Pantone 805C) so that the high-contrast between paper and text is easily readable and the unusual bright colour is eye-catching. The palette utilises tints of the colours.

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Visual Experiments: Logo II

Previous post

As you know, this project came from a previous module, and so I have a fair amount of branding already done. Still, I think it’s good to test out a few things to make sure I can make the best out of it.

The top line has been drawn over with felttip pen to give a pleasing ragged edge then scanned.

I wanted to experiment with the thickness and density of the scribbles making up the letters, so used different pens, pencils, crayon and charcoal with varying strokes to achieve this. Here are my experiments and notation about what worked and what didn’t.

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I also found that I like the ‘e’ tilted so that the crossbar is pointing upwards rather than horizontal.

I do really like the current logo because Stowe has a pleasing weight and neatness that I didn’t achieve in the new experiments whilst still retaining a craftiness. I don’t like writing the Framework underneath – I’d rather have it typed – because it provides contrast and looks more polished.

From this stage, I’ve gone onto tinker with the logo some more and used the experiments above to refine the look.

I used Illustrator to create a vector file and touched up the letters.

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Playing around with a website logo and favicon using different weights of Archia.

After consultation with my esteemed cohort, I am go with logo 5 as it has a nice balance between the two elements:

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  New

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  Old

As you can see, the Framework in the new logo is now justified under the Stowe and with a bolder version of the typeface. The t in Stowe is more defined too. A good result!

For the favicon, I’ve decided on this one:

It will work at a small size and on light and dark backgrounds, as shown above.

Visual Experiments: Logo

As you know, this project came from a previous module, and so I have a fair amount of branding already done. Still, I think it’s good to test out a few things to make sure I can make the best out of it.

Typefaces

I am using the typefaces Archia (san serif) and Calendas (serif) from the Atipo Foundry – I like pairing the typefaces from the same foundry as it gives a more cohesive feel. Both have a few difference styles in the font families, but not so many to be overwhelming. Calendas Plus is a serif font with a pleasing stroke contrast and is suitable for long stretches of text. It also has some interesting discretionary ligatures as extra glyphs (see the as and us below) that give it a special feel without being too distracting for the reader.

Archia has a modern geometric feel that contrasts to the traditional feel of Calendas. The ‘a’ is single story, like Calendas, and some letters like the lowercase ‘l’ have slab serifs to make reading easier. The descender of the ‘g’ has a flattened base, and the ampersand has a flattened top loop, which gives it some distinction. It can be used for very heavy text, for captions in small sizes, or in lightweight spaced capitals for headings.

Licenses

I’ve checked the licenses for these typefaces and I can use them for what I want. I have bought them.

“this font family can be used for personal and commercial works. you can use this font at a single home or business location on a maximum of five (5) cpus.

• you can do any kind of design work with this font family, including logo/trademarks design.
• the font may be used in editable embedding pdfs and other similar documents.
• the font may be used in e-publications.
• this font family can be embed into one (1) website (unlimited pageviews) so that it can be displayed on any browser.”

The logotype uses a scribbled graphic style that is used to sketch out how a typeface might look in the first stages:

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This is the logo that I have been using:

The top line has been drawn over with felttip pen to give a pleasing ragged edge then scanned.

I wanted to experiment with the thickness and density of the scribbles making up the letters, so used different pens, pencils, crayon and charcoal with varying strokes to achieve this. Here are my experiments and notation about what worked and what didn’t.

• 

• 

I also found that I like the ‘e’ tilted so that the crossbar is pointing upwards rather than horizontal.

I do really like the current logo because Stowe has a pleasing weight and neatness that I didn’t achieve in the new experiments whilst still retaining a craftiness. I don’t like writing the Framework underneath – I’d rather have it typed – because it provides contrast and looks more polished.