Calico Cafe

The Calico Cafe offers playful drinks and the chance to hang out with adoptable cats—it's a cat lover's dream.

Services:

Graphic Design

Branding

Challenge

The owners of the cafe wanted to develop a design concept that separated them from the rest of the other cat cafés. They wanted a theme that would entice cat lovers from far and wide.

My Role

Graphic Designer

Tools

Photoshop

Indesign

Illustrator

Firefly

Solution

We landed on the concept of a calico cat. It’s a distinct color variation and pattern that belongs to the domestic feline species. The various patterns of calico cat can be turned into many branding variations. It’s a highly recognizable cat color scheme that people will be drawn to. The concept of the logo was to merge the two ideas of the coffee shop and calico cat together. I created a playful calico cat that is subtly shaped like a coffee cup.

Mood board

Getting a feel for the direction the project will go in. brainstorming on cat themes that could be implemented in the brand concept. Merging the idea of a cat with a cappuccino cup and the calico pattern.

Conceptualizing Business Assets

Right away I like to think of assets and how the design can be incorporated. An unhindered flow of ideas that are captured in my mind.

Sketches

Went through many rounds of sketches. Below are examples of some of the drawings and the top 3 sketches that inspired logos that were presented.

Color and Pattern process

The cat logo had to have a calico pattern. I explored various patterns, colors, and positive/negative space variations. After experimenting with numerous designs, I carefully refined the concept until the final version captured the desired look.

Final Logo

Calico cat in the shape of a cappuccino cup. A clean and playful pattern on the cat with a calm welcoming expression. chose a bold and chunky font that looked like a hip vibe with a unique use of negative space and shapes in the font.

Stickers

I created promotional stickers that convey the experience a customer will have at the cat-ffee shop. Created different designs that related to the logo. For example, all of the cats have the same eyes and the overall roundness of the shapes relates.

This menu is chock-full of punny phrasings, such as Meow-cciato, Kit-tea, Capurr-ccino, Meowka, Catnip Salad, etc. The typography chosen sticks with the theme of the logo. I added a playful element where it looks like a calico cat is batting at the coffee beans from behind the menu. Overall, it promotes a cat-tactic time!

Walls

The walls of the cafe look like a giant calico cat is lying next to you. The oversized pattern is not only a fun attraction but also compositionally photogenic for selfies and social postings. It gives the customer a cool backdrop to their fun at the café.