Branding Redesign: May Richer Fuller Be & CSW Designs

For awhile now, I've been dreaming up new looks for both May Richer Fuller Be and CSW Designs (my Etsy shop), and finally got a chance to sit down with my creative brain this weekend to make it happen. I rolled out the new blog header and Etsy shop logo on Sunday night, and made a few tweaks yesterday. I think it's done, but I can't promise it won't change again :). If you're reading this on an RSS feed like Google Reader (which is going away - alas!) or an email version, you'll want to click over to the full blog to see the changes.

I had a few goals in mind when it came to the redesign:

• Have consistent branding across both the blog and the Etsy shop (fonts, colors and style).
• Keep it simple, but give it a unique look.
• Use Illustrator (i.e. force myself to continue to learn the software).
• Add a tagline so that new readers know what I write about and do on this blog (May Richer Fuller Be doesn't exactly scream "design/life/DIY blog"...but that's what it is!).

To show how all the aspects of the new design work together, I made a little "branding board" for both the blog and the Etsy shop.

Here's the one for the blog:

And using many of the same elements above (fulfilling one of my goals - consistency!), here's the branding board for the Etsy shop:

You can click over to the Etsy shop to see the new logo and shop banner "live."

I even threw together a business card for fun. It's not really necessary, but I was already having fun designing all these elements, so I threw that in - we'll see if I ever actually have them made! I guess my shop is technically a business, so it makes sense, sorta, to have a business card?

The part I'm most excited about is the pattern I created in Illustrator to fill the letters in the logos. It's modern and clean-lined, and almost looks glassy (shiny? I can't decide). Super fun. It comes in three of the "theme colors" of the blog. 

You might also notice that the blog background disappeared. The the watercolor-y chevron pattern didn't make the cut, unfortunately, even though I still love it. Since simplicity was the name of the game, I wanted to let the new logo have the spotlight - so out it went. 

My homepage photo got a little face lift too. The border around it is now filled with the same pattern as the letters in the header.

Let's play the before and after game, ok? :) For comparison, here's what the blog header looked like before:

And after:

The Etsy shop logo before (far right on the side bar):

And after:

I certainly don't claim to be a professional graphic designer, but I'm loving this new design. I'd love to know what you think, too, so leave a comment if you'd like (don't be shy!).

Have a great day!