The network for creativity
Join 1.25M professional creatives like you
Connect with clients, get discovered, and run your business 100% commission-free
Creatives on Contra have earned over $150M and we are just getting started
Back to feedPost
Most designers open Illustrator first. I open it third.
My logo design process has 4 stages, Research, Ideation (pen and paper), Design, Presentation. Illustrator doesn't open until stage 3. The thinking always comes before the execution.
For Cocoa d'Or, a luxury bakery brand inspired by Parisian café culture, I spent the first two stages deep in research and sketching before touching a single vector. The name itself guided the symbol "d'Or" means gold in French, so the mark merges a cocoa pod cross-section with a gold coin, forming a floral symbol that works as a wordmark, standalone icon, pattern, and favicon.
Usability over aesthetics. Always.
The network for creativity
Join 1.25M professional creatives like you
Connect with clients, get discovered, and run your business 100% commission-free
Creatives on Contra have earned over $150M and we are just getting started
Challenges
View all
Related posts
I just joined Contra and I’m still figuring out how things work around here, so I thought I’d introduce myself instead of quietly lurking.
I’m Mariya, founder, strategist and lead designer behind Mariya Design. I’ve worked internationally since 2015, and today I run a boutique branding studio focused on brand identity systems for premium and luxury-led brands.
Most of my work sits somewhere between identity, packaging and the wider system around them. I’m particularly interested in what happens after the logo: how typography, color, packaging, digital applications and brand rules actually hold together as the business grows.
One project I’ve been revisiting recently is SAE-REN, a premium beauty and wellness identity system. I’m currently rebuilding some of my case-study presentation system, so it felt like a good one to share here first.
And since I’m genuinely new to Contra, I’d love to hear from people who have been active here for a while:
What actually helped you become part of the community here?
Was it sharing work regularly, joining conversations, applying to opportunities, or something else entirely?
Any early mistakes worth avoiding are welcome too.
great designs..
A look at the identity I’ve been working on for Sync, a car rental platform in Greece.
You pick the car you want and a local provider brings it to you. Pretty good starting point.
The goal was to give them a brand that could sit comfortably next to the big rental companies and still feel like people you’d actually want to rent from.
I kept their pink and built the layouts around a shape inspired by a car’s side mirror with real cars and Greek scenery inside it.
Big Greek headlines, plenty of space and a system their team can keep easily.
Impressive work, colors are great in use.
Everyone wants their brand to look "premium" but almost nobody can define what that actually means.
In crowded industries like digital marketing, premium is the absence of noise. Every unnecessary element is removed until what's left earns trust on sight and can be immediately recognized.
Designing Nyxora meant understanding that trade-off and building for legacy.
The identity needed to feel current enough to compete with the top agencies out there, but grounded enough that a client would hand over a real budget without hesitation.
The result is an identity built on purpose, one designed to earn trust before it earns attention.
Case study: https://rb.gy/hy6hs1
Nice