One Fast Buffalo‘s branding for El Fenix restaurants is diverse in its delivery while maintain traditional roots to the Mexican culture. Centered around an Aztec inspired illustration of a phoenix bird, the brand comes alive through each touch point, sending home the vibe of true-Mexican cuisine.

We studied the visual history of the brand and worked to develop a new brand identity that adds a new level of style and sophistication to El Fenix but with a timeless feel. This was followed by improvements to menus, signage, packaging, outdoor ads, interiors, merchandise, uniforms, and more.

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Brand Brothers designed this dual identity for a restaurant and delicatessen in Montreal. The typography really shines in these two identities, especially for the deli, La Manade. It’s simple enough to be readable and different enough to be engaging and intriguing. I like the use of only one color on top of black and white to make the color pop and give it life. I think the “B” mark in La Boqueria could have been done better, but you get the idea and it works.

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Ahhh, why not post another food truck branding project? This one is for the  Juice Truck and designed by Glasfurd Walker. Bright, juicy colors mixed with strong, simple typography give this truck design and brand pop!

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Not all restaurant branding initiatives have to have a large budget. In fact, when it comes to independent, one location restaurants smart branding is knowing where one can cut corners and streamline with a do-it-yourself methodology. That’s what Mission Minis did in San Fransisco. With a tiny budget they were able to customize common elements like stools, molding, and chairs to build a brand based on a strong color palette that screams “tasty cupcakes!” Designed by Antlre Creative.

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The brand for the bar and restaurant, Glass House features high contrast color palette and black and white photography. This gives it a sort of nostalgic and classy feel. The typography for the restaurant’s logo is well done incorporating the glass mark in the actual type. Catherine Bourdon, the designer, explains her direction:

Branding for a restaurant/bar/venue specialized in homemade beers, tasty snacks & live music. Consisting mainly of seasonal menus and live show flyers, this one color identity on colored stock allows for cost effective reproduction and recognition.

By infusing a little bit of grit and copy machine imperfections to contrast its simple and sleek aesthetic, the Glass House’s new look still manages to take a nod at the venue’s punk and hardcore roots.

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Widgets & Stone, from Chattanooga, TN, designed this lovely, easy brand for Easy Bistro & Bar. The use of dots to outline a flourish effect then continued through the logo’s type treatment gives it an airy quality. Almost like it was sewn without thread. I’m very impressed how it plays out in the tile floor, but wonder how it’d be embroidered. Great work either way.

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Starkly black and white, but maintaining a air of royalty and refinement, the brand identity for 28 Hong Kong Street by Manic proves you don’t have to always have a ton of color to make a bar’s brand interesting. Most of the time a bar isn’t going to have the lighting to warrant colors anyway. With dim lights comes lack of color recognition so a bar’s brand better translate properly in pure black and white. 28 Hong Kong Street does.. very well.

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The team at Toormix designed another brand for the José Andres family of restaurants.

China Poblano is a mexican and chinese restaurant located in Cosmopolitan Hotel Las Vegas and directed by chef José Andrés. The identity design plays with the iconography of both cultures and we’ve developed different graphics for the restaurant: menus, cards, napkins, stickers, … and some elements of the facade and interior of the restaurant.

What really stands out about this particular design is how they’ve used red and green without feeling like Christmas. It’s always very hard to do this and they’ve built a vibe that stands on its own. Maybe it’s the use of the pattern, maybe it’s the use of the cream color to pull away from pure red and green. Either way, it’s well done and the restaurant’s brand looks like a Jose Andres restaurant without being stale or too similar.

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The brand identity for the food truck, Curry Up Now, does a fantastic job of creating a vibe and expectation from the get go. With hand drawn typography that mimics the style of the Indian alphabet, patterns, colors and treatments that nod to the culture and an overall brightness, this food truck makes you hungry just looking at it. All touch points are well done and well executed from the food truck’s design to the menu and all things in between. Designed by Design Womb. Pictures by Michelle Edmunds. Found on Art of the Menu.

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I love the design and branding for Hula Girl Foodtruck. It’s fun. It’s islandy. Slightly expected, but well executed. The colors are just dead on and the entire vibe adds a flair that gets attention.  Seth Design handled this one. I’m loving the design work on these food trucks, even featured one in my book Fire It Up: Building Restaurant Brands that Blaze.

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