Madison L Designs
dxe316 | Tue, 02/03/2015 - 20:53
Brief from client
"Madison L" should be easily readable.
Designs should be less prominent.
Hello guys!
I am working on building a logo for a Jewelry company in New York.
Can anyone provide any feedback on what they think of this logo.
22 Comments
Looking tasteful already! The readability of the 'L' is a problem. It just looks like a elegant swoosh with this font.
This is their original logo.
Very illegible and difficult to read.
More thought should definitely go into the text and logomark. The small fonts will not scale well and one-colour options are nearly impossible. Also both fonts are very bland and overused, however with a bit of work a logo for a company like this can look really good. Take this one back to the drawing board.
When you say "The small fonts will not scale well and one-colour options are nearly impossible." Do you have any suggestions to fix that?
I agree with Shawali about starting new, however some ways you could reduce printing and 1-colour issues with this logo could be not having a floating background as part of the logo. When the logo is printed out at 1 inch wide, it should be completely legible with no elements lost. Tiny text simply reduces the readability of the overall logo, and many times a logo would be completely better off without it.
When you say tiny text are you referring to the "Designs" or the smaller "L"?
If I eliminate the "designs" aspect, would it solve the sizing issue.
Yes, it would mostly solve the sizing problem. (Even some of the thinner lines in the L could be problematic) But your logo still has the issue of the large L in the background and the bland fonts as noted by the other designers.
Okay. There's a lot happening in the old logo. Rough and dirty. But they want a more readable logo? And you have to use the green 'L'?
Yes 2m4, they want to keep the Green L - as is.
The company name is Madison L Designs, and form what i understand they are called incorrectly Madison Designs.
Hence the logo revamp.
Sorry, but when I look at your logo, all I read is Madison. The L looks like a floating ornamentation.
Algerian, the main font, is really poor. It's one of these types that come for free with Windows. It looks really unprofessional and no designer in his right mind would ever use it. It also a font which contains it's own decorations, which you wanna avoid also. Century Gothic is ok-ish, kinda of the same thing as Algerian.
Beside that, your main problem is composition. As I said, I only see "Madison" and certainly not "Madison L designs". Each elements is totally disconnected from the other ones, there's no logic in their placement.
Finally, there's nothing in this logo that says "jewelry". For my money, I would have said it looks like a cheap brand of Champagne. I know that a logo shouldn't be as informative as much it should leave an impression, but this right here doesn't leave the right one, if any.
I think you need to restart from scratch. The original logo is indeed horrendous. All the more reasons to steer away from it as much as possible. Start fresh with a pen and a piece of paper and sketch a few dozen ideas. Get as much inspiration from www.logopond.com www.dribbble.com or Pinterest as you can. That also on of your problem here, is that this logo looks very uninspired.
And here's the 10 questions you should as your client before starting the creative process : http://breezycreativedesign.com/2010/01/26/10-most-important-questions-t...
Don't hesitate to come back here, we'll be happy to help.
Good luck!
Hi Shawali
Thank you for your helpful critique on the font and the logo.
Algerian is a font the company proposed me to use for them, do you have any recommendations that I can use instead of it, if not, any font sites you can recommend?
The main impression they want to convey is the L.They stamp their jewelry with this exact L, which is why I must incorporate it within the logo.
Check these sites out :
- www.losttype.com : full a top professional grade fonts. The flip side of the coin is that you tend to see some of them everywhere.
- www.fontsinuse.com : you'll discover a lot of existing fonts and how they are used. Helpful to expand your types knowledge.
- www.typophile.com ; a very useful forum about fonts, especially the Type ID section.
- www.typography.com : the official site of Hoefler & Frere-Jones, one of the main foundries.
The new font you chose is really terrible. I'm sorry but that font is one of those fonts that keeps designers awake at night. Try and choose a different typeface for the "Madison Designs" and work on composing those two words together separately before worrying about how they work with the "L" in the background. The "L" is actually kind of alright. Just make it lighter and it will work beautifully with type on top of it. Overall, you need to start over and only minimally use what they are making you use from the old logo. If you can get them to change the typeface for the tagline then I would do that as well. I hope this helps, sorry if it seemed harsh!
Hi Kayla,
Not harsh at all, I appreciate the feedback.
As far as the font for "Madsion" it is one they choose themselves so that is why I went with it.
"Designs" is in talks to be dropped from the name all together so as a compromise I added the word in an unprominent (thats a word) way so it wouldnt make or break the logo.
I will see what I can do about the coloring of the L and the typeface for the tagline.
Do you have an suggestions?
Besides the font issues, what are your thoughts on the concept for the logo?
I like the green L but don't think i like it as an L. Think keep it floating lik it is then use a fresh Type face for madison l designs. Leave the background l as more the symbol and don't use it as the L in the name
Looks like wine label. Not jewerly. Do not use standart fonts. Correct untidy lines in the big letter L.
Cannot really add much to what said before.
I recommend you start again, you can keep the L as a base (Since it is a must use).
Good luck.
Cannot really add much to what said before.
I recommend you start again, you can keep the L as a base (Since it is a must use).
Good luck.
I feel your pain about the client requiring a certain type font and logo element. Other people have posted pretty much everything I would say here, except that Algerian need not be so dull if you make some changes to it (see sample).
One thing I think should be mentioned here : your client shouldn't impose a font on you. Most of the time, it'll be some crappy ones they liked when they did the flyer for their kid's 5 years old birthday party.
In the best case, it can only tell you what kind of direction they want you to take. But that's it! In your case, they obviously like a vintage kind of thing.
But the bottom line is: you are the pro, here. These kind of technicalities are your business. You should tell them what they need and decide what you need from them. not the other way around =)
I agree with pretty much everything everyone else said(total cop-out comment :P). I will say, when a client tells me I need to use a specific font, I normally work up a logo using that one, then create one or two more that I think look better and send them all at the same time. Normally they agree with my choice. It's kind of a designer loophole. Like Shawali said, you are the professional, not them. You know what looks good, and it's not algerian. :P
there's so much information it's unreadable :S
there's also 3 different fonts..they don't go well together
(thumbs down for typo i clicked the wrong side lol)