Feministy Logo

This is a logo I did for Liz Abinante's Feministy, crafter of uniquely simple knitwear designs. When we started discussing a logo design, we reviewed a bunch of other knitting-related logos and found that, in many cases, knitting imagery like yarn, yarn balls, and knitting needles were heavily used. I felt that moving away from that would help differentiate Feministy from other designers out there.

One thing that Liz wanted in her design was her name: some know her as Feministy, others as Liz. A good logo would form a single image of her.

So naturally we turned to her as an starting point for the design. Liz herself is a big part of why her business succeeds - she sells knitwear designs yes, but also easy and clear instructions, and useful and personal feedback - this is a designer you want to know. While we were talking, she came up with the term "knitting mother" and we really clung to that. We coupled the "knitting mother" concept with her fashion, interests, and the word "feministy" itself; she's a fan of vintage fashion - and that '50s-'60s Mad Men thing is certainly en vogue - and domestic arts. But she's no 1950's housewife, she's a modern woman, an entrepreneur who is interested in playing with the idea of '50s woman, celebrating it at the same time that she flips it on its head. She's "Feminist" but cuter and more playful: "Feministy".

This is the idea that emerged as the winner in the initial concept phase. It's hard, when you've got something that seems to click so well, to imagine doing anything else. Though she does knitwear and the patterns of the designs are beautiful and seemingly opportune for a logo, they have less to do with her.

Here is my initial sketch for the logo:

1950s SciFi: Them! and Plan 9 From Outer Space

 I'm doing some more art for Little Red Bicycle based on bad movies. These two pieces are representations of Them! and Plan 9 from Outer Space, each using the colors of the yarn.

For Them! I drew an iconic movie still - the first time the giant radioactive ants appear on camera. This is the movie still I based the illustration on:

This was an interesting project because here I'm basically copying someone else's work right? I did this for a few reasons: the movie is actually good (despite its special effects) and has some excellent imagery, and budget constraints prevented me from spending a huge amount of time researching ant anatomy. This had me thinking as I went about rehashing this movie still as an illustration: what is my role as an illustrator? If the point is that this is supposed to look like a movie scene, then why am I drawing it?

I realized that there is a lot an illustrator can do when working from photos in the realm of clarifying and refining an existing image, much like someone touching up a photo. The ant effects aren't really that good in Them! and, though that's definitely part of its charm, as an illustrator I have license to improve the ant: to make it scarier and more defined, as in the detail shot below:

The art for Plan 9 is successful, I think, but it was more challenging. There are so many facets to the movie and the print size of this artwork is pretty small. So the task was to accurately depict the movie without cluttering the small image. The scene I ended up drawing involves a graveyard, the palm trees of San Fernando, flying saucers, and the living dead. I really did want to add in Vampira, the cheesy aliens, and Bela Legosi, but I don't think it would work visually.

I also recreated the text from the original movie poster which was pretty fun. Even the campiest typefaces have rigid rules that they follow.