Zephyr Learning Logo

This was one of my first projects where I was working with a client externally from the University environment. The Client needed a logo for their new company 'Zephyr Learning'. In the original briefing, the Client informed me that they had already attempted the logo, however they wanted to make a few simple changes.

The key elements I needed to focus on for this brief were to:
-Capitalise the letter Z
-Move away from the red and black colour scheme.
-Keep the logo corporate.

My initial idea was to start with logo experiments in Illustrator to get an idea of how different typefaces would work with this logo. I focused most of my logo variations on clear, simple type. In order to emphasise the company's e-learning business, I thought about changing the colour of the letter 'e' in Zephyr. My initial logos are shown below:

As a development idea, I thought about somehow incorporating an L shape into the Z. I soon realised that all I needed for this was to place a thin line halfway through the Z as shown below. I liked that this ensured the learning part of the original logo still had a subtle presence. I sent this suggestion to the client in the same format as the logos above in order for her to compare them against one another.

As I was unable to meet the Client in person, these logo variations were numbered and sent as a PDF via e-mail. 

The feedback was positive, the client agreed that the Z/L split worked for their logo. The next task was to experiment with a variety of fonts. The client's favourite font, which she wanted me to use in particular was Cronos ProDisplay.

During the feedback discussion with the client, she suggested using a more subtle colour scheme so I also sent her a range of black and maroon colour variations:

In response, the client specified that she and her work partner's favourite variation was number 5 in the red and blue variations. She was pleased with everything except the colour at this stage. The final task was to change the logo colours to the client's preferred choice. Her suggestion was to try chocolate brown, with orange. And also to experiment with a selection of Autumnal colours such as copper, brown, beige etc. She also wanted to see how the logo would work with a dashed line instead of block. My response is shown below:

The favourite this time round was logo variation number 4. This was chosen as the final logo.