Salvage was an identity project focusing on creating a brand identity for a fictional company, specialising in the manufacturing of up-cycled products and furniture.

 

Up-cycling, unlike recycling, is defined as the process of converting waste materials or useless products into new materials or products of better quality or better environmental value. This gave me the opportunity to experiment with unconventional materials in place of traditional paper based stationery.

 

The design for the project originated from the patterns found on the back of sandpaper.  Often this information states the strength of the sandpaper amongst other product details. By replicating this aesthetic using details about the company to create a pattern, I laid the foundation of the graphics for the business.

 

Sandpaper often has no set registration due to the way it is produced; the position of the pattern often differs from sheet to sheet. With this in mind I printed onto much larger sheets of paper and them cut down with no attention to the registration of the prints, in order to give each item an individual positioning.

 

From early on I had decided that as the products produced by the company were up-cycled, I wanted the aesthetic of the identity to look like it too has been up-cycled. But what if the identity itself could be up-cycled? After some research, I stumbled across a group of designers working on what they called P&P Office Waste Paper Processor. This takes your waste paper, then glues and wraps it around a piece of led to make a pencil. From here, I played with the design of the letterheads and by leaving the logo at the bottom of the page, I was able to take the letterheads and inspiration from the aforesaid designers to create branded pencils.