Designing Brand Collateral: A Case-Study Tutorial with Abi-Haus Restaurant

How do great brands happen? And, as a designer, how do you create and nurture that experience for guests and fans?

Restaurants are the perfect frame for learning how to build a branded experience. There are so many opportunities to connect with your customers: menus, signage, a digital presence, environment styling. Every element communicates a mood and aesthetic on top of your message. This class shows you how and why they all fit together.

Abi-Haus is the restaurant I founded with my friend Jimbo in the Texas town of Abilene. We started with just a vision and a logo, but, within a few months, we opened for business with a full suite of branded, designed communication collateral that instantly conveyed our point of view and intrigued the community.

What happened is a testament to the power of design. Our brand brought guests through our doors, and within weeks our reputation was locked. Design brought us success.

What You’ll Learn

This class is ideal for intermediate-level graphic designers, especially those interested in case studies about brand design, brand execution, packaging, and the hospitality industry.

It will be especially useful to those interested in taking over the creative leadership of a new product or place. For our purposes, that product or place doesn't have to exist, but it should have well-developed motivation and a strongly articulated concept.

• Introduction. I'll explore our motivation for opening Abi-Haus and show off the design details that really make the space.

• Logos. Using Abi-Haus as our foundation, we'll explore primary logos, secondary logos, and icon work. You'll learn how to prioritize logo iterations and apply them in a variety of channels.

• Secondary Logos, Icons, Guidelines, and Menus. We'll explore how to create secondary logos and how to use them, how to develop a set of coordinated assets and icons, how to use grids that make sense for your type, and how to create a content-heavy piece of brand collateral (the menu).

• Branded Exteriors and Interiors. Bringing our restaurant concept full-circle, we'll explore how to style and structure a sense-stimulating space in step with your brand.

• Textures. In the concluding lesson, I'll offer final advice on texturing design elements, choosing type, as well as insight into branding your own projects.

Above all, you'll gain real-world insight into constructing a brand. Because everything is demonstrated through the consistent voice and style of Abi-Haus, you'll see what it really means to put a brand into action.

What You’ll Do

Inspired by the case-study workshop format, you'll follow along with why and how we developed the Abi-Haus brand in order to create a suite of your own branded materials.

• Deliverable. You'll design a set of six  brand assets including a primary and secondary logo, icon set, menu, and a large mural.
• Brief.  First, you'll choose a product, place, or person and develop its brand story, articulating the mood/tone/style you hope to achieve. You'll formalize your brand rules, design a piece of collateral with a significant amount of copy, and sketch large-scale art or murals that anchor your brand experience. Lastly, you'll play with textures, typography, and other visual elements in ways that enhance your design system.
• Collaboration. As you go through the class, update your project to share your progress with your fellow students. Ask your peers for their perspective on your assets. Give each other critical feedback.
• Specs. By the end of the class, you'll have a tangible suite of branded materials and the design clarity to carry them into new channels.