One of my first identity projects at Ozark-based Robison Creative Studios was for a growing church in Oklahoma called Noble Assembly of God. The primary requirement for the project was to incorporate a dove and a flame—and do it creatively, of course. This proved to be the mantra for future church branding projects (with additional juxtapositions including hearts and crosses) and a request that I would come to dread. But in my design naivete I took on the request with idealism and excitement.
I love typography so one of my favorite places to start with any logo project is manipulating letterforms. With the Noble Assembly of God logo I started with the typeface Futura as my base (one of a handful of typefaces I find to be ubiquitous in design). Futura added a modern flare to the overall design without being overly-trendy. The geometric precision of the letterforms also provided a great foundation for the icon, specifically the symmetry of the Futura “O.”
With a typographic base established, I began to experiment with the curves of the flame. It’s always an interesting challenge graphically portraying a flame; there’s this fine line you walk where it can look like corny clip art or go to the extreme of cliched tattoo, but every once in a while you find a great balance. I finally styled a flame that I felt was a good balance and started playing with the juxtaposition of the flame and letterform. As I overlapped and masked I started to see the curves of the dove manifest. The form was subtle at first, but with some refinements of the flame I was able to make the negative space take on a more defined dove shape. The challenge of merging dove and flame was complete; the leadership at Noble now had a clean, contemporary icon that looked sharp on a letterhead and had a bold, dramatic presence when enlarged on massive banners within their sanctuary. But I still needed to integrate the logotype.
The icon had such a clean, modern feel that I decided it needed to be grounded with a slightly more conservative typeface. This was a bit of an update for Noble Assembly of God; we wanted to make sure we didn’t alienate the congregation by thrusting them into a hyper-modern identity. I tried some of my standbys like Adobe Garamond Pro, but felt it was a bit too conservative. Finally I decided to give Bodoni a shot and loved how the geometric precision worked with that of Futura and the icon itself. The thick-to-thin contrast also gave some variety and rhythm to the logo, keeping it from feeling too heavy.
The final touch was to add a splash of color to allow the icon to pop. I chose a muted red to keep with the classic, sophisticated theme already established and to tie the symbolism together with the blood of Christ.
All together the Noble Assembly of God logo has become one of my all-time favorite marks I have worked on and is a case-study of how some of the most cliched symbols can work together to form a compelling graphic icon.
