Parenting

The anatomy of a logo

by Scary Mommy
Updated: 
Originally Published: 

People often tell me that I’m not as scary as my name would lead them to believe. Take it up with my son, as he was the one who named me. When I was just starting to think about a blog, Ben was two and going through a big scaredy-cat phase. He had just seen some Disney movie and was afraid of everything: His room, his car-seat, his brother… and me. The moment he uttered “Scary Mommy”– and once I saw that the .com was available– I knew that I had my blog name.

I immediately put my graphic design training to work, and starting identifying the characteristic that was most me. It’s usually a pretty good place to start. The choice was obvious: My hair. It’s big and unruly and problematic and just always an issue.

The logical image for me was some type of Medusa character. I could get across myself, along with the nasty, edgy side of motherhood that I sought to portray.

The problem was, that it looked too much like me. I wanted an image that would appeal to all of the scary mommies out there, not just the crazy, curly haired minority.

So, I found an image of a lion and built the design around him.

I softened them up with some ornamental frills and added a star and some bloody gore to provide a backdrop for the text. Next, I added depth by putting several layers of splatters over the whole thing and topped the image with a crown. Naturally.

The next step was the hardest. I’m kind of a font freak and wanted the perfect one: Something that was bold, but unusual. Legible, but not too simple. It’s not as easy as it sounds. I turned to luggage labels, which I always love, for inspiration and saw the same type of lettering repeated over and over again.

Once I found a similar font, it pulled everything together for me. It was never a question what color the lettering would be- pink had to make an appearance somewhere, after all. A sunburst in the back tied in the new color and that was that.

So, there you have it: Scary Mommy, deconstructed.

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