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The Coffee NUBIA Logo Design

5 Dec 2018

Coffee Nubia logo design – reflecting a café

The making of Coffee Nubia logo was one of the most exciting enterprises we had been given. The idea was to reflect the essence of this café. This is not just a coffee place, it is a hub that welcomes the African Caribbean community regardless of tribe but also any other races for one of the best coffees but also African, Caribbean and European delicacies. It puts the city of Manchester in the diaspora’s map.

Many coffee places, although serving other products, use coffee as the centre of their symbolism. This is an aspect that the quality of the coffee served urged to reflect, without getting its aroma and strength lost in the one-dimension of such superficial symbolism. Coffee, it was going to include but not just coffee, exactly like the place itself.

Coffee Nubia logo design – reflecting a community, a hub

The foundation of the place resounds in its name, Nubia, which refers to a region of Eastern Africa. The first thing we thought about therefore is to go to the other side of Africa to look into the symbols that characterise the other aspect of the hub. So, unavoidably, we looked into and browse through Adinkra symbols looking for a representation of what it is that Coffee Nubia represents for its community of customers. The Adinkra signs contain many attractive and adequate signs in terms of their meaning and impact.

The community aspect resounds in the BOA ME NA ME MMOA WO1 symbol meaning “help me and let me help you” and represent the cooperation and interdependence which distributed diasporas are reminded of in such few places as the café. FUNTUNFUNEFU DENKYEMFUNEFU, the “siamese crocodiles” is democracy but ore importantly in our context, unity in diversity.

NKONSONKONSON, the “chain links” means unity, human relations and mainly confirmed that there could be quite a number of options for this project. Together with the ESE NE TEKREMA, they were a favourite because they looked like a bean, which would allow me to include the coffee. The latter symbol has the the literal meaning “the teeth and the tongue”, and represents friendship, interdependence but also,  But I was not satisfied.

Going even deeper in the symbolismadinkrahene

Then I came across the ‘chief of all Adinkra King, the ‘chief of all Adinkra designs’, the Adinkrahene. In everything it was, it appealed to us and represented the project. Its strength and shape was coffee. Its responsibility and leadership. Its inspiring character is reminiscent of those moments when great authors are typing their opus in coffee places, businesses are being set up at the corner of such places, people are getting together ideas to lead the future. That was the symbol we were going to go with. Not at once apparent yet clearly unveiled.

It is one thing to find the symbol to design, it is another to design it. The Adinkra hene is perfectly formed in most of its designs but when you look into it for too long, it is like getting lost in a cup of coffee. In effect, it looks like the circles of any liquid into which a drop of liquid is falling. We explored this, the designer and myself for a while. I felt we were near the final idea, but I still felt it was missing the essence of the coffee, the after-taste, the impact.

Elevating the stain

This is where it occurs to me. Just like we take for granted the origin of our inspiration, such as how the comforting homeliness and hospitality of a coffee shop favours our ability to reconnect with our inner muse, there is a part of sitting at a coffee place that most of us completely ignore or even try to wipe out, the coffee stain. Those circles, in which I once saw liquid dropping into liquid suddenly became the stain that a cup leaves behind, similar to the trail of its presence that is the aroma in the air. There it was, the idea I sought, I found it. Certainly some will still see it as just-poured coffee and we did our best to allow for that because it is different perspectives that make a hub. But the coffee stain , the leftover after all is drank and said, is that little surplus that this business offers.

We weren’t out of the water yet. Branding is an identity that had its shape but begged for the remaining elements of its look and feel. The colours, the font, the size, they all had to be determined, played with, evaluated, eliminated or selected. The final colours chosen were not just there to say Coffee and Nubia, they were also selected as a canvas to showcase the multiple colours and vibrances that each individual and group brings to Coffee Nubia.

1. http://www.adinkra.org/htmls/adinkra_index.htm

        

Find out more about the café on The Coffee Nubia website

Find out more about 3E web media logo design on the Multimedia content creation page

Mimoto branding, website and logo design

31 Aug 2017

MimotoMimoto is a Federated Identity Management Consultancy. The team offers consultancy services and bespoke software development related to identity management, identity assurance, authentication and authorisation services.

3E Web Media was called in to help with managing the digital branding of the company. This consisted in the design and development of the logo and static website. The latter uses Jekyll and Github. With a static website, the owners ensure that maintenance will be minimal and that the team can concentrate on doing their work and adding website content which corresponds to their experience and expertise.

Mimoto is the Japanese for identity and the company already had their name, purpose, direction and expertise sorted out. In effect, the team knows how to use Github and Jekyll so the work really boiled down to fitting in and designing a style around the ideas they had, creating the web structure and the web template and arranging content within that structure.

The style of the website follows the simplicity of their approach and the Japanese inspiration to choose the font face and size, the colours and the shape and produce an effective to the point branding guidelines, website and logo design.

Sometimes, it takes a more incremental approach though to properly see where one is going. This is how the company chose to release their website. With a minimal content in early release, the website is cleverly managed to only deploy new elements as they are fully developed.

Mimoto website

 

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