Museum of Exotic Mammals

Branding Design

How can we create a brand for a museum with elephants as its main logo?

Referencing real elephants as a guide to creating an elephant logo. The name Museum of Exotic Mammals was used because it creates the acronym MEM, short for memo since elephants symbolize memory. The main colors used in my logo are a soft blue color and a magenta color.

Francis Lam

Solo project

6 weeks

Adobe Illustrator, Photoshop

Branding, Logo Design

Team members:

My Role:

Duration:

Tools:

Category:

Logo Version 1

Logo Version 2

Stationary Set

Storefront Sign

T-Shirt for Gift Shops

Process of Design

While searching for inspiration, I found this image of an elephant. I sketched the elephant twelve times on paper. I focused on creating three different shades to better understand which one looked better. From there, I drew three more of my favorite ones.

Image Referencing

Image Source

Paper Sketches

Favorite Sketches

After warming up with sketches on paper, I began to design and create the elephants in Illustrator. I began by drawing an elephant’s body and head with rounder shapes. And then I began to create an elephant with more rigid lines.

Sketching

Illustrator Sketch 1

Illustrator Sketch 2

Illustrator Sketch 3

I decided that sketch 3 was the best since it looked very clean and suited a brand for a museum. I then had to decide where to place the text for the museum name itself. Below are several drafts I had on where to placed the words.

Word Placements

Draft 1

Draft 2

Draft 3

Draft 4

Draft 5

Draft 6

Soft blue is a friendly color and symbolizes a welcoming feeling. Magenta represents universal harmony and love. These two colors combined are meant to portray the unity, acceptance, and welcoming of people of all ages, gender, nationality, religion, etc.

Deciding Colors

Magenta

HEX #912b60

RGB 145, 43, 96

CMYK 0, 70, 34, 43

HSL 329, 54, 37

Soft Blue

HEX #679be3

RGB 103, 155, 227

CMYK 55, 32, 0, 11

HSL 215, 69, 65

Using the design from the sketch three, I darkened the outline and put the logo in the middle of the body of the elephant. I then used the Magenta and Baby Blue color to match the design with the brand colors.