Place Portland is a Portland-base real estate team working with residential buyers and sellers, serving the Portland metro area.
Their unique selling point is community focus, commitment to client care, and emphasis on building long-term relationships with their customers.
They needed brand identity as their their marketing efforts expanded to keep up with the rapidly increasing client base. The logo needed to represent a sense of place; home; trust. A simple, timeless mark that is transferable across home sales at different price points, and transferable to other real estate companies and locations.
I immediately thought of the signage and advertising hanging above the doors of local businesses in the high street where I grew up. These really expressed professional individuality within a local community. Traditionally hanging signs were designed to project out into the small streets and grab the attention of the community as they strolled by. As forms of advertising they have always been perceived as local and quaint, and that is what I wanted to borrow for this project.
To create a logo that conveyed a sense of community spirt, and long-term commitment was the initial plan, but introducing strength, integrity, and professionalism was imperative.
I began sketching different marks to represent the brand but soon realized the name "Place Portland" IS the brand and focused in on the typography and composition. After experimenting with different arrangements, "Place" became the mark and through subtle manipulation of negative space in the A I was able to further reinforce the clients identity with their target audience. This solution effectively does that while avoiding all the stereotypical pitfalls associated with real estate iconography. The logo was created in black and white as this was the intended end result and any embellishment would be gained by embossing or debossing the logo.
Final logo design for Place Portland.
