I have worked closely with Graffiti Design on a few projects in the past. They are an award winning signage company offering high quality bespoke sign solutions. They came to Good Looking Design looking for a re-brand and a new website which would showcase their vast collection of impressive signage projects. They were a great bunch to work with and we collaborated well to create this modern, sleek and minimalistic ident.

In February GLD went up to London to have a meeting in the House of Commons With Dr Michelle Tempest and MP Guy Opperman to discuss producing a website where doctors could get together to raise important points about the NHS health care system. The website allows doctors to become a member of Doctors Think Tank, upload a profile, create articles and comment on other members views. The idea of the site is to find out what people on the front line of the NHS think about the current state of the health care system and what improvements could be made. With a polling system, votes can be collated and shown to the big wigs of the health care system to try and generate change. Good Looking Designs role was to come up with an identity for Doctors Think Tank which would stand out whilst still looking professional and corporate. The website design, layout and project management was also part of the job spec. In under a week the Doctors Think Tank already has 50 members on board, hopefully it will soon grow and help make a positive change.

A new client came to GLD looking for a website for their company. The owner is a very inspirational person with a very interesting background. Her company is called Phoenix Fitness and the name of the company is based on her life experiences and changes. After she sent over her original logo alarm bells started ringing. The logo was clearly a stock image with a circle behind it! The logo is the most integral part of a businesses identity, if that logo went online, it wouldn’t matter how nice the website looked it would be discredited because of the poor logo. After a quick chat to Sharon she allowed GLD to re-design the logo and this is how GLD went about it.

1. Concept Sketches
The premises behind the design was already strong, Phoenix Fitness is a really well suited name as it gives aspirational connotations. A phoenix really needed to be present in the design but without being tacky. After several sketches GLD came up with the idea about incorporating the phoenix and circle into one object.

2. Import and Trace
Now that we had the concept the next step was to scan in the image and start tracing around the image in Illustrator.

3. Tidy and Develop
Next thing to do was to tidy up the lines make them stronger and also build the face of the bird.

4. Colour and Text
Now the fun part begins. Adding the colours and text. Sharon’s one request was that the phoenix is purple. I think it was a very good colour choice for the industry she works in, vivid and unisex. The logo looks good but not great, next thing to do is to add some depth

5. Refine
By playing with gradients and overlay effects we now have a logo which is striking and full of depth in visuals and concept.

Hello all. Thanks for coming to Good Looking Design’s new shiny site. It has been several months of work and fifa sessions to finally get it to this state. The blog will be used to keep you all up to date with the latest news and gossip going on at GLD. If you want the latest updates every time there is a new post then please join using the RSS feed. Also if you are excruciatingly bored right now, then why not add GLD as a friend on facebook, linked in and twitter. If you really like the site then please tell your friends to come visit. The aim is to develop this blog into a great resource for designers.

Thanks
GLD