Creating your Company Logo
I can’t quite remember who gave me this sage advice, but I’ve found it to be incredibly useful throughout my professional life, both as an artist and now as a small business owner. The advice was this “You don’t have to know how to do everything in order to be successful, you just have to know how to hire the people that know how to do the things you don’t know how to do”.
Graphic design is not one of my strengths. After trying to fake it and calling on friends for help from time to time, I decided it was time I bite the bullet and pay a professional Graphic Designer. My company needed a clear and distinct logo that visually represents all that is Palisade Posh. This logo will be the foundation on which I build my company brand. This in turn will weave all the different aspects of Palisade Posh together including the blog, boutique farm, artist retreat and Airbnb. I hate to say it, but I learned the value, power and concept of ‘branding’ from our 45th US president. Branding is an important element in marketing one’s company!
With this thought in mind, three weeks ago I reached out to a Graphic Designer I found on a referral list provided to me by my SBDC Leading Edge instructor. There were two designers on the list one of which was a woman. I decided early on that I’d like to work specifically with women to build my business. Perhaps it is the feminist in me, but I believe in supporting the sisterhood. Whenever possible, I seek out strong women to work with and strive to be one myself. In so doing, my goal is to be a positive role model for my two daughters. But, I digress…
Using the referral list, I reached out to a local graphic designer, Alysa Sanzari-Hall of SHG Design. Unfortunately, she had recently moved out of state… thank God for the internet and Zoom! Although Alysa is now located in AZ, we were able to successfully work together remotely. Using Zoom, we conducted our introduction meeting over our computers, I filled her in on my company, what I’ve used design wise in the past and what my goals and objectives were for the present and future. After our initial meeting, she drafted up a contract that outlined costs and services rendered and I sent her sketches, visual images, and examples of my previous business cards etc… With our terms agreed upon, we set to work.
During our first round we identified the visual elements of the logo, images based on my past designs and different Fonts for the text part of the logo. Fonts… I discovered are really hard to decide upon. The original Font I was using what difficult to come by, although eventually we did find it. However, I opted for two new Fonts. The trick, I learned with Fonts is to find different styles that will work well together while creating visual variety within a single image. I think the subtle differences between the Fonts was what I found the most difficult to get my head around.
While the Font exploration was going on, we were also identifying and as it turned out reidentifying the image I would come to use in the logo. In the case of Palisade Posh, we ultimately decided upon two visuals, one relating to the Poppy flower and the other paint brushes. Originally my design, incorporated the seed head of the Poppy flower as I really liked the shape and it reminded me of the stage of life I am currently in (mid-century or in the middle stages of my life). However, as the design continued to be developed, I came to the realization that my original concept was just not working visually for what I ultimately wanted for the company brand. So rather than maintaining what I often call “the death grip” on that concept, I let go and let the creative process take over. The outcome of this decision was the inclusion of a beautiful and brightly colored Red Poppy flower in bloom! We went with a visual that included varying hues and values of Red, that created a flower that had dimension and energy, both of which are characteristics that reflect the company.
As we nailed down the central image, and the Font, we also explored the placement of the company name ‘Palisade Posh’ and the incorporation of paintbrushes that represent the artistic component of the company, my own artwork and the future artists retreat. This exploration included determining the direction of the brushes, how many brushes and the shape the brushes would form in combination with the company name. I used the concept of the horseshoe and how it was strategically hung to best capture good luck as my inspiration. In a nutshell, if you have a horseshoe and you want to hang it say over a doorway, you want to hang it so it is facing upward, thus capturing good luck in the ‘U’ shape that it creates… if you hang it so the horseshoe is facing down, all your luck runs out. Superstitious? Perhaps… but why not take that into consideration! So, if you look at my logo, you will notice that both brushes are facing up and combined with the word ‘Posh’ at the bottom create the same directional force that an upward facing horseshoe does. The word ‘Palisade’ then contains the luck and keeps it always present within the Red Poppy, which also carries a lot of symbolism associated with it.
Interestingly, the most common meaning associated with the Red Poppy is that of remembrance. Therefore, you will often see the Red Poppy flower worn on Veteran’s Day. Beyond remembrance, the Red Poppy also symbolizes dreams, imagination, regeneration, and luxury among other things. These four points are what resonated with me and my vision for Palisade Posh and so the Poppy seed head evolved into the Red Poppy flower in bloom.
With our Font, and visual images nailed down, the last piece of the logo puzzle was the tagline that would accompany it. Here too, we went through several iterations before finalizing two distinct taglines, one for the Airbnb and the other that spoke to the farm and the artist retreat. The logo with the tagline “Reinventing Comfortable Luxury” will be used specifically for the Airbnb an all-marketing material and swag related to it and the logo with the tagline “Inspiring Creative Living” will be used for all things related to creativity and the farm including this website and blog! It was Andy’s brilliant idea to create two separate taglines... prior to that we kept trying to merge the two concepts and it was just too long, it just wasn’t working. It really does take a village and in the case of creating my logo(s) my village was the amazing Alysa, my equally brilliant husband and myself.
So that is my creative journey in redeveloping and redesigning my company logo and the official start of branding Palisade Posh. I’ve already trademarked “Palisade Posh”, so next on my ‘to do’ list is to copyright both logos and taglines. Until then, see the contact information regarding my graphic designer. I highly recommend her and look forward to working with her in the future!
SHG Design
Alysa Sanzari-Hall
720-557-9997
