Branding: blāc

Type: University
Semester: 4 (2015)
Skills: Branding, Corporate Identity, Corporate Design, Photography
Co-Workers: Nikki Canivé, Florian Tatscheck, Sebastian Wippenbeck</p>

Task:

Develop a strong concept for a fictive fashion label.

Concept
1. Profile
2. Philosophy
3. USP
4. Audience
5. Products
Claim
1. Brand name
2. Logo
3. Claim
Typography
Photo-shoot
Storytelling
Design and produce a product brochure
1. Sell your stuff
Design and produce a brand-book:
1. Corporate Design Manual
2. History, Mission, Vision

Finals:

Brand-book:

Product brochure:

Marketing:

Target Analysis: who do we want to sell our products to? Geographically, Socio-Demographically, Psychologically, how do they behave? In which sinus target group do they fit? what are their characteristics?
Mr. X: Male 25-35 with a high education, living in big cities, creative profession: designer, architect, photograph, etc. successful looking for a stylish but practical fashion. Loves modern neat structures. Willing to pay more for lasting products. Is a producer not a consumer. Performer. Striving for new solutions and refusal of conventions but with a strong need of recognition for his work, not himself. Research: what is specific to our target group? How can we reach them? What do they want, what do they need, what do they have what are they missing? Which style exists, possibility for something new? which conveys? Creating a Map. Competition: what are the competitors doing? where can we place our company on a quality price axis compared to our competitors? Is this place still free? What do the competitors do right, what do they do wrong? How can we get a voice? Is this a niche or do we have to shout? my work process Observation: do surveys on specific target groups. How do they behave? How is the mainstream evolving, how is our niche evolving, will we still be able to sell our products in 10 years? Which Art, Style, Artists, Organisations, Possibilities fit to our brand? Magic: Focus and combine all aspects into something new and appealing for the specified target group. Pointing out 8 characteristics: Elegant, stylish, self-willed, Minimalist / Purist, Crazy, Exceptional, Willing / Strict, self-confident. USP: Black / Dark fashion for men. Some brands offer dark clothes aside, but none focus solely on it. Selling basics? Nope, the fashion's key visual's set with geometric figures in a shining white as contrast.

WE It is not who we are that matters but what we do. blāc stands for social criticism by uniformity, authority, finity and infinity, style and elegance.We were founded 2012 by four great design students from cologne. We began by selling shirts and later widened our range to suits, trousers, polo and accessories. The goal is to give a large fashion range that covers every modern man's need from a to z.

AIM Our vision is the decline of clothing relevance and visual overstimulation with the aim to create free space for your creativity.No matter how fucked up your are,with our fashion you’ll still look sharp as fuck. Our aim is to enhance our customers lives and creativity by reducing the style and colors of our clothes to its essence. As Form Follows Function.

Logo:

blac logo

SOI With the purist & modern brand-logo blāc now has a unique and exceptional emblem that reflects the brand statement on the one hand and stands out from the over saturated clothes marked on the other hand. The impressive strength of the enclosed letters are not only willing and self-confident, they also underpin one of blāc's major statements: nonconformist achieved by uniformity. The stylish slogan seems self-willed by the condensed style, and thus supports the picture language of the brand. The metric elegance confirms the brand's great quality, seriousness and professionalism.

METRICS The macron above the a gives the tone. It isn’t just a nice key visual to use, the macron also sets the metric layout by giving us some essential x values. As you see it determines the strength of our lines and the height of our sub-lines. Lastly we can set the safe area according to the macron. Which is at least twice the square you can draw within the macron.

COLORS You may also use any other color. However, keep in mind, that color should only be used very wisely and as little as possible. We don't love color but we like to break conventions, even our own.

WORDING Being rude is OK for any what soever campaign with indirect communication. But never ever be rude to any one in a direct communication or to any of our customers in any direct situation like e-mails, papers, chats, conversations, etcetera. Always keep polite and friendly in a direct communication as if you were speaking to a friend of yours. Unless he asks for it. Words like “Buddy” or “How are you mate?” are great. Try to give our customers the “great friend“ feeling.

blac productfoto nikki BEING BLAC We are a high-quality fashion brand from Germany whose goal is to improve the lives and creativity of our customers by reducing the color pluralism of todays world: with blāc you gain time for the essential things in your life because you don't have to worry about any color combinations what so ever. You'll stand out from the crowd, as the mainstream attempts to attract attention with gaudy bright colors, the blac productfoto shit real effect is reversed: unremarkable dark clothes suddenly become noticeable. With blāc you set a statement, dark fits any situation, no matter your social class, the event or the place, blāc is right. blāc's aim, is not to stand in the way of creativity. we, 4 great Design students, founded blāc 2012 in Cologne: Florian Tatscheck, Sebastian blac productfoto domina Wippenbeck, Nikki Kanivé and Thibault Jan Beyer. At the beginning we only sold awesome t-shirts but over time we extended our range to polo, shirts, suits and trousers. As final goal we try to cover the Fashion range from A to Z. blāc is social criticism by uniformity, authority, finity and infinity, danger, style and elegance. The vision is the loss of clothing relevance & visual overstimulation with the aim of real creativity. blāc makes all other colors look old. No matter how fucked up you are, you'll still looking sharp as fuck.