Redesigning My Blog Logo… Again!

I’ve been a busy little bee lately. I don’t know if it’s the Whole 30 energy I’ve gotten or what, but I finally made ANOTHER change to my blog I’ve been meaning to make to Blog Clarity… an updated logo!

If you remember, when I first launched my blog, I revealed this logo and header:

I knew it was pretty busy-looking and not perfect, but liked it regardless. However, after a while, my simplistic side just couldn’t overlook the busyness. So I simplified it and reintroduced the header like this:

You all gave me lots of feedback as to how much better you liked it. Yay! But one thing’s been nagging me since then: the script font.

You guys, I looked high, low, and sideways before I found that script font. And I REALLY loved it when I chose it. It’s called Moonface Script. While I still like it for many, many things, it has some technical issues in the ligatures (how the letters connect) and I was never crazy about the capital letters (they looked like a baseball team logo). Note: Sounds like the creator updated the font so maybe the ligature issue is fixed, but I’m in love with my new font so switched anyway!

If you’ve taken Media Kit Smash or Content Brew, you’ve probably noticed that at bigger sizes the font does this (notice the i and a):

With all that in the back of my mind, I’ve been leaning towards something more handbrushed but honestly didn’t have time to look around more than just a little.

Luckily, my new font just dropped into my lap.

Down the Font Rabbit Hole

A couple of weeks ago I got my usual Creative Market email and when I opened it up I saw this beauty on sale for just $12!

Before I bought it, I tested Manhattan Darling with all my course names, with my blog name, with blogging words, and even with words from older Pinterest images I’d make using Moonface Script. Lowercase, uppercase I did it all. The verdict?

PERFECT.

And of course, when it comes to fonts, I kept going down the rabbit hole and re-did my main three fonts. I’ve never loved how Museo Slab looked as my headings and I really like Museo Sans, but it doesn’t seem to bold correctly in Chrome. Plus, I figured if I was changing this much, I should use a favorite font I’ve kinda stalked for a long time: Brandon Grotesque.

It’s probably the most streamlined and gorgeous font ever to exist (says me the font nerd). And according to MyFonts.com, it’s their most popular font. Since I use TypeKit (free with my monthly subscription to Adobe Creative Cloud), I get the web version free. So I installed that and then got a couple of typefaces for print so I could do various design elements in Photoshop.

I changed my body copy and headers to this font, but I’m still playing with weights and sizes so this still might change a bit!

And finally, I’ve been using Lulo Clean for quite a while now but decided to integrate it into my blog logo. I got it for a STEAL at $9 (it’s now $49).

It’s a widely-spaced font so I do adjust the kerning sometimes (the space between letters), but I love this font’s flexibility for design. While it mirrors Brandon Grotesque in a lot of ways, I still find they can complement each other when used in the right weights.

The Results

So with all that in mind, I created a new logo:

You might also notice the “Bright Ideas for Brilliant Bloggers” tagline in my header is gone. Why? It just looked too crowded. So I reworded the right side of my header to say “Tips, tutorials, and e-courses for brilliant bloggers.”

Along with the change to my header, I updated the sidebar images with the Welcome and my headshot. So far, so good!

Aaaaand, I’ve also been making changes to another part of Blog Clarity, which I’ll be introducing you too REAL soon.

With a new header and all that jazz, I updated this little graphic so please give it a pin!

Design Takeaways

Thanks for listening to my ramble of the behind-the-scenes process of my design update! I figure that the more you know about the design process, the better you can apply the knowledge to your own designs, whether it’s a logo or a pinnable image. So after all that geeky font and design talk, remember this:

• If you don’t love something about your site, change it. Don’t worry that your readers will think you’re flakey. It’s YOUR brand and you’re stuck with it for the long haul, so you might as well be happy with your choice.
• Before you purchase fonts, play with it A LOT. I know to do this (I even mention it in my book), but even still my first script font choice didn’t work out. Use the website’s type tester to try out your blog name, relevant words you’d use in design elements or pinnable images, and so on. Also use a uppercase and lowercase so make sure you like individual letters.
• Ask for feedback from a small group. This isn’t something you want to post to your Facebook page because you’ll get potentially 15 different responses. Show your logo ideas to a small group for feedback. That’s how the diamond above my “i” ended up tilted- it was a suggestion from a friend.

Have you tweaked your blog design lately? Been planning to?

This post contains affiliate links in case you want to fall in love with some fonts.