Skills
Word Mark Design
Art Direction
Social Media Design
Packaging Desgin
Needed: A branding and packaging design for an organic mixture of traditional Iranian flavors and classic American granola
Aziz founder, Saman Maydani, wanted her branding to be vibrant, friendly, but also a little mysterious. She wanted the Persian language mixed with English and a very contemporary styling, something a hip and fun. I suggested keeping the package without a window, and without imagery of granola—focusing on the bold colors and pushing the Persian text, all to add to the package's luxury feeling. The wordmark pairs the Persian and English so that the letters making the long "e" sound in "A'zeez" (both of which make use of dots) can share their dots create a connection to connote that this is a product of two worlds, two languages, and ultimately two people: the baker and nosher.
English font exploration—looking for something to be a good foil to Rabie's rounded sweetness, but not without attitude. Landed on Gopher by Adam Ladd.
Font Exploration for the Persian. Looking for attitude, but also friendlienss and modernity. We settled on Rabie by Ethar Elaagib.
Persian reading left to right, this is the character breakdown of which letter is which sound.
Making the connection
Working in black and white I played with the way to connect the marks and share their dots. The lowercase "i" would have a dot above, and represents the same sound as the letter with the dots below in Persian, a perfect place to share a dot! Was it too clever to have the lowercase "i" represent a spoon? After testing this version a bit I found the spoon idea was not communicating, and I wished to both maintain the connection, but also better separate the words, most likely with color.
Next was colorways that could reference ingredients in Aziz' flavors: Cardamom Pecan is a standard pairing of very Persian flavors that are not too out of the ordinary for Western palettes, and Saffron Rose a somewhat intense flavor that leans hard on the Persian flavors. The Saffron Rose flavor, she said, was a granola interpretation of Sholeh Zard, a traditional rice pudding that is served for holy days.
Tahini and specifically halva are sesame seed products of Iran and the middle east generally. When made from black sesame seeds and paired with cacao it takes on an incredibly rich color and flavor (this was very yummy research). And finally Pistachio Coffee takes two things Persians take as seriously as Westerners take Wine production. Coffee culture in the region dates 800 years or so, and is a big part of the famed Iranian hospitality.
As a part of my freelance practice I make use of a workshop group of trusted designers to offer feedback on works in process. Everybody needs another pair of eyes sometimes. As I was explaining my combination of letters and the sharing of the dot in the "ee" sound of Aziz, I was asked why the Persian didn't get its two dots and let the connection be visual. We know the "i" is connected just by looking at it they reasoned. I realized in that moment that if the design had stayed as it is on the left above, the Persian actually doesn't say "aziz". Looking only at the green letters it says "azbaz".
In addition to the necessary information required for small-batch products (ingredients, net weight, et cetera), Saman wanted this quote from Persian poet Hafiz of Shiraz, and I was happy to include it. Something poetic and another reference to her country of origin.