Uttam School for Girls
Uttam School for Girls is an all-girls school in India. To commemorate their 25th anniversary and to bring their identity up-to-date, they commissioned me to design a new logo and rebrand the school.
I designed the logo, website and brand collateral including the school almanac, notebooks, admission forms, certificates, official school stamp and t-shirts. I also helped create a brand language which reflected the school’s core values and principles.
Branding
The Brand Language
Defining Core Values
The school places emphasis on providing a holistic education to their students—meaning focusing on each student’s mental, physical and spiritual development in addition to their academic learning.
There was a need to define the core values the school identified with, as the use of too many words became ineffective over time. I guided them in narrowing down five core values, each with twofold meaning, that they felt represented their student body’s spirit the most.
School Almanac: cover design
School Almanac: interiors
School Almanac: cover design, before and after
School Almanac: interiors
Bringing Things Up to Date
While redesigning school forms, I removed outdated language, added relevant sections like that for a single parent/guardian and made it easier to navigate the form with a cleaner layout. I also created a digital form, making it convenient to enter the data online in addition to the printed option.
In addition to the brand collateral, a custom postage stamp was created to mark the milestone of the school completing 25 years. The school’s art department was commissioned to make a watercolor illustration of their iconic red building for it.
The Logo Design
The new logo was designed to reflect the courage, resilience, grace and femininity of the students with the symbolism of a griffin (a mythological creature with the body of a lion and the wings of an eagle). I chose to replace the lion with a lioness. The symbolism of a lioness carries the power of the feminine to work together rather than to compete, which is an imperative value for the school's student body.
An Indian sentiment was embodied with the addition of a lotus (India’s national flower) to represent transformation, regeneration and growth. Like the Buddhist saying “no mud, no lotus”, it also symbolizes resilience—a core value of the school.
