BESPOKE MOUNTAIN BIKES
Presented here is a concept brand kit for "Bespoke Mountain Bikes," a bicycle shop that specializes in custom made bikes. Most of BMB's advertising is done online through their website, marketing emails, and paid ads. I created the following brand identity and additional web marketing template to be used by the company.
Shown above are mock up examples of a newsletter or plausible website homepage design. I created all of the elements to represent the brands bold style. I wanted the call to order to catch your eye with the "New Merchandise Out Now!" heading. Located at the top and in a bold color, the viewer will be drawn to check out what the site or newsletter has to offer. I created a mobile display as well since mobile use is an integral part of how we view media.
THE BRIEF:
Bespoke Mountain Bikes is a bicycle shop that specializes in custom made mountain bicycles.
The word, "Bespoke" means customized and is also a wordplay of “spoke” which is in the center of bicycle wheel.
The clientele are mostly outdoor lovers who love to hike and ride bikes down mountain trails, are adventurers, and love to take risks. The riders are mostly male but also have some female clientele.
Most of the advertising will be done online through their website, marketing emails, and paid ads. They also need the logo to look and read great in small places.
The concept company is interested in bold typefaces such as sans serifs and will print their logo on bikes and apparel.
Email Marketing Design
There were various ways to design an email marketing template. Below are different designs to show the company's message and overall feeling. The first is a welcome email template to introduce potential prospects to the brand. I also designed a second email marketing template notifying subscribers of an upcoming new merchandise release. Lastly, I've shown different sized paid advertisement examples since most of the company's advertising will be done online through their website and paid ads.
When creating this welcome email, I wanted to illustrate the brand's message, feeling, and show the different design elements of the brand. I wanted the viewer to get a sense of what Bespoke Mountain Bikes can offer them, which is a world of adventure and fun.
I started with a photograph that perfectly showed the colors I wanted the brand to have. Combined with a backdrop of mountains, I thought this would make an excellent starting point. I extended the skyline and added the logo, I created the graphic mountains, and added a watermark style wheel to show the adventures feeling of the brand.
I also created another email marketing template to notify prospects of the release of new merchandise shown below.
This layout would be used for newsletters to notify customers of upcoming sales and deals. Since the original brief wanted to focus on the sales of not only bikes, but apparel as well, I created various mockup options of merchandise the brand could sell through their website and promote on paid aids.
Lastly, shown below are a few ad formats to be used by Bespoke Mountain Bikes. The brief specially mentioned that they would use paid ads, so I wanted to include a few different ad sizes.
When designing the advertisements, I wanted all of them to be cohesive with one another and have the brand's colors throughout. I feel like the ads do a nice job of showing viewers the look of their products and what Bespoke Mountain Bikes can offer.
CREATING THE BREAKDOWN
When creating the brand identity, I did some initial research in what kinds of logos and colors other mountain bike companies have. I found most of them to be fairly simple with unique ways of combining elements of bikes into their logos. I wanted Bespoke Mountain Bike's logo to be unique and stand out against other brands which is why I chose a more illustrated but still simple approach. Shown below are the full brand guidelines I created for BMB.
MOODBOARD
For the color palette, I drew inspiration from a mountain sunset. I choose the light blues of the sky, deeper turquoise tones of the mountains, and beiges and greens from the earth. I also wanted a pop of color to represent the adventurous spirit of mountain biking and chose an orange tone. The orange tone also signifies exhilaration and fun and the adventures spirit of the brand's riders. Paired with the darker blue tones, the orange accent gives the brand a pop of color and excitement.
All of the colors were pulled from nature since the brand is designed for a clientele that love the outdoors, hiking, and taking risks. I wanted the colors to be bright and vibrant to show the vitality of the brand.
For the font, I chose sans serif fonts since this is what the client had specfiaclly requested. I also feel like it matches the boldness of the brand's feel and colors.
In the mood board, I choose images that exemplified what the brand is about - adventure, trails, friends in nature, and of course bikes. I also made sure to select photos that had the brand's color palette throughout.
ALTERNATE LOGO DESIGNS
Creating the logo for Bespoke Mountain Bikes was a bit challenging at times because I felt that there were so many different directions I could have went with the design. I knew that I definitely wanted to have illustrated elements of a mountain bike wheel and graphic style mountains because they'd make great iconography for the brand later on.
I selected the current logo because it felt the most balanced and had the word "spoke" in the center of the wheel in reference to the wordplay of the brand's name.
The following are logo pairings that could have also worked for the concept company. However, some of them lack the balance the selected logo has.
INITIAL SKETCHES
Shown below are a few rough sketches of the layout and logo in the initial planning period. I was really inspired by the spokes of a bike wheel and knew I wanted to have that be a part of the design.
