Design — Logo for YFoK

Exactly one week ago, I received a write-up from my dear friend Sreejesh about ‘Young Folklorists of Kerala (YFoK),’ a new initiative by Vayali. He left a voice note for me mentioning the YFoK logo launch scheduled on the 22nd of August 2022. Then it dawned on me that I’m expected to create a logo, get it updated after feedback and release a print-ready version before the said date of logo launch!

Since I have a little more than two weeks of time to complete the work, I started my research about existing logos connected with folklore, culture and tradition.

The Brief

Young Folklorists of Kerala (YFoK)

A collective platform to drive and network among the young people of Kerala, who are involved in studies and research in the field of Folklore. There has been a drive and consistent leadership from the Nattarivu Patana Kendram in the past. That really set and molded the earlier researchers and studies in the field of folklore and local knowledge systems.

We at Vayali felt a vacuum among the new researchers and the need to form a network of young folklorists or young researchers in the field of Folklore or Local Knowledge systems. The YFoK, envisages to network with all the like minded people, who are involved in in the studies and academic activities in the field of Folklore and Local Knowledge Systems. It will be simply a collective platform to drive the further development of the folklore research and field studies in a uniform and professional manner.

Idea 01 — The Chosen One: ‘The Warrior’

While doing a research on cave paintings, I came across this photo of a replica of rock paintings by ancient humans.

This inspiration, along with the intention of featuring the alphabets ‘Y’ and ‘F,’ started taking shape as doodles.

This direction had a lot of promise and the doodles evolved into a digital form.

Once I’m convinced about the design of the logo, I moved on to the logotype design using the typeface ‘Arima Madurai’.

And, yes! You are right — the rectangle around the logo is the default ‘frame’ under ‘Custom Shape Tool’ menu in Photoshop! I just flipped it horizontally in the logo for a better visual balance! 😅

The monochrome version of the logo appears to be working well on various grey background colors.

I also designed a ‘filled’ option for this logo idea. But this version failed to secure approvals from the stakeholders.

Finally, this idea 01 got selected for the logo unveiling ceremony of YFoK. Yay!

Let’s now see the other two ideas submitted as options for YFoK logo.

Idea 02 — People and Houses

The inspiration came from the intricate needle work on clothes made traditionally that uses geometric shapes.

On an abstract level, this logo conveys the image of people holding hands. Also, did you see the decorated houses with grassy front-yard?

The repeating pattern of this logo opens up avenues for interesting graphic designs for marketing. The logotype is designed using the typeface Baloo Chettan 2.

Idea 03 — Footprint

This idea is based on the notion of “following the footsteps of those who came before us.”

A fingerprint pattern can be alluded on to this footprint logo bearing similarities with a very ornamental letter of ‘Y.’

The typeface used to design this idea 03 logotype is Abeat by Kai.

After reviewing all the three logo ideas from me, I received a feedback that the stakeholders found it very difficult to choose one logo among those! Finally, they went with the idea 01 — ‘The Warrior.’ I’m sure that the other two logo options will find their place on the future projects from Vayali.

Free image resources used in this post

• Horizontal poster mockup on wall: FreePik
• Poster in a brick wall mockup: FreePik
• Embroidery pattern: FreePik
• Footprint on sand: Unsplash

UPDATE 23-AUG-2022

Today, as planned, the YFoK logo was unveiled to the public by Mr. M B Rajesh, Honorable Speaker of Kerala Legislative Assembly.