New Year, New Launch
The Modern Brilliance rebrand was my first big and juicy branding project at Stuller. The second in my entire professional career after the Ragin’ Cajun Foods rebrand, done for Acadian Kitchens.
My story begins with a girl named Natalia…
To be fair it actually began with research and a thorough competitor analysis. My amazing team put together extensive slides detailing what other wholesalers do to focus on lab-grown diamonds. It was then decided to give the brand more accessibility to our customers. Stuller has an array of Lab-grown diamond jewelry offerings and here is where my job started! How could I freshen up the brand and get people excited about a semi-new type of fine jewelry?
Modern Brilliance would be reenvisioned into a more identifiable brand by having its own content page on Stuller.com. My personal goal was to make a highly elevated brand that spoke to women and men with confidence and timeless tastes.
Three mood boards emerged out of my imagination, Bright Bleu, Modern Neuve, and Posh Patriot. Three different types of rich.
My copywriter, Claire Lyon took my simple mood boards and a list of keywords I had in my mind and she developed an entire brand story to match each board. From her fingers, Natalia came to life and we knew we had a spark of something special.
Speaking of a spark, I had so many ideas for a logo and mark. I tried focusing on separating the word modern from brilliance. There was a duality in the name that mirrored the duality of comparing natural and lab-grown diamonds. Funny enough, an LG diamond is made from a teeny tiny piece of a natural diamond. There’s a chemical or physical process that then transforms this “seed” into a stone that is optically and chemically identical to a real diamond. The difference is impossible to tell, so it’s very important for your jewelers and diamond sources to keep clear records and labels.
But I’m getting carried away. The second round of logos all included the concept of this diamond seed. Something big is being made from something small. A spark that ignites an idea. Here are some screen captures of the process. I always think these are so cool to look at, like peeking into a hidden room.
The big presentation of our final concepts was quite a stressful moment for Claire and me. Prepping was most important, I tried as hard as I could to be as knowledgeable and clear about the brand. At this meeting, we clarified the creative direction and got a better feeling as to what the team was looking for. I’ve always struggled with public speaking but I’m in the mindset that the more you practice, the easier it gets. I’m becoming more and more comfortable with my own voice and trusting my creative instinct to steer me right in the moment.
Modern Brilliance now has a logo, tagline, color palette, badge, brand statement, and brand roadmap. It’s really coming together!
It was time to create digital assets, populate a content page, and publish it for the world to see. Launch photography would feature 3 model shots and 5 item shots, 8 in total. I got to work on style guides for the photographers to use. Take a look at the style mapping and final product side by side!
As you can see sometimes things don’t work out but those are sometimes the best shots. It’s so fun to be able to work and collaborate with other creatives. My creative team at Stuller really is so talented.
The hero image really meant a lot to me. I’ve been lucky enough to direct quite a few photoshoots at Stuller and it is always incredible to me how much trust they put into my vision. The designer is really relied on to make creative decisions. Sometimes it feels like a lot of pressure and sometimes I am unsure what will happen. But the moments where everything works out are just so precious. This was a moment I envisioned from the genesis of the rebrand. I felt like I had manifested this image in the studio. She is a beautiful confident-looking woman but I felt this emotion in my bones. It was like the puzzle pieces of my life fit together perfectly and for a moment I was 100% sure that this was what I was meant to do forever, I was meant to be a creator.
Wait, you wanna see something funny. This was a test shot we took the day before the model came in. I was the lucky stand. I present to you….
Marlee Drew, Girl Detective.
I don’t know how long the MB brand will stay as I’ve made it but I am so honored to have a mark of my own within the Stuller brand. The MB content page is launched and look out for a quarter refresh. Claire Lyon also wrote an awesome blog article explaining the brand better than I could dream of.
This is only the beginning! I can wait to see what we can accomplish together next.