OUGD601 - Practical Development (Typography)

To gather further research into the design of the subscription box, I looked at several examples of typeface used in fitness branding, as well as on existing boxes. Fitness brands like Gym Shark and My Protein were found to use simple, bold sans serif font. This works well for the products they sell, as much of the promotion evolves around growth and body mass. Making a bold title for the products gives the design a bulkier feel and makes the products more suited to the design.

Generally, the fitness brands such as these would either apply the logotypes to their clothing, supplement packages or social media and websites.

On the other hand, subscription services like Graze and Dollar Shave Club would apply their logotype and other information against the background colour of the box. The brown cardboard was often found to be the background colour for these designs, which gave each design a less gendered feel and more of a neutral approach. This could potentially be one way to apply the design without it looking as though it is targeting a particular gendered audience.

The branding used in the packaging would often be frequent throughout, with branding on the outer cover as well as the inside. Adding patterns or symbols in various places would give the design consistency but also played on themes of the package or the season in which it was made.

Ideas

• create a package that utilises the brown background colour of the box
• focus on the typography and patterns that are to be applied
• another option could be to look for a white box that will keep the design neutral
• use sans serif and maybe a bold font for the design
• think about the theme to portray as well as the season
• consider inside branding of the box. Could it be wrapped in paper which uses the design?

Brand identity name

As the themes behind the subscription box refer to health, vitality and fitness, I looked at words relating to this nature and settled on Panacea. The meaning of Panacea is to "heal all", meaning it is a remedy and restores strength and vitality. This was fitting for the product, as the items inside would be considered as post workout remedies, such as muscle relief and calming ointments.

Key Communicators

• Neutral design approach, making the product unisex and gender fluid.
• Fitness themed but perhaps season themed also
• Minimal colour palette
• Contemporary approach
• Post workout products/remedies

As previously discussed, the design would be best suited in a sans serif font, as this would give it a strengthening tone and contemporary feel. The fonts that were used in the process showed modern features and bold expression, which was ideal for this design style.

After discussing these potential fonts, it was decided that Arial Bold would be the chosen style to use for the box. It offers strong, legible letters and consistent shape throughout. This is something that will be needed if the design is to feature in different areas inside and out the box.

In comparison to brands such as My Protein, the font was slightly tighter in the kerning. However, trying different spacing allowed the font to be tried at different sizes. These examples show how the font can be used as a repetitive pattern, how it looked when next to other sized text and variations of colour as well as styles.

With this in mind, the brand name was tried on a cardboard coloured background to see which style looked best. This way I could get a better understanding of how text might look when applied to a box and what colours would work appropriately together.

Here I had considered the design as purely text to place on the lid of the box. Developing this idea further would mean trying different patterns and playing on the idea of negative space. One thing that was also considered was to create a logo or pattern in the design that would communicate to the audience a feeling of energy or activeness.

At this point I knew that the design would need to reconsider the approach and find a theme or style to work from.