When we started developing this brand from scratch we went looking for a few foundation stones. She has run this store for many years already, and the name “Andersens Hobby” is already established. Now we needed to take the name and package it in something recognizable and memorable.
Digging to the Bottom
Looking for those foundation stones, we decided to work from the basic idea of stitches. A big part of Andersens Hobby is knitting, so I looked closely at some real-life knitted stitches and realized they are a pattern of these:
A single knitted stitch. Simplified graphical version.
So I made a pattern of them like a knitted sweater, and then subtracted until I was left with the shape I wanted.
Mint and Cream
The shape was in place before we selected any colors. The image above is in the finished mint-green color though. A lot of the things she sells in her hobby-store is colored mint, so at her request, we picked a good shape.
From there we picked out a couple of matching colors. Cream white and that shaded mint green for a retro feel, and adding a touch of brown for being a country shop.
The Typeface
For a typeface we picked Aleo. It has a certain roundness to it which gives a touch of a homely feel, but also has the straight lines required to convey that this is an orderly place. We felt we had found our match.
The Aleo typeface in action, writing out words in Norwegian.
The Brand Guidelines
We had selected the most important foundations for the brand.
- Colors.
- Logo.
- Typeface.
So from that solid foundation we can produce the necessary assets. Like this poster that we put up all over town to invite folks to come to the homely country cafe.
An example of bringing the Andersens Hobby elements together into a poster.