Cisco Pride
Like many Bay Area companies, Cisco sponsored San Francisco Pride and many employees were marching in the parade on behalf of the company. For this event, I created the branded collateral, which at first included banner and t-shirts.
The Work
For pride month, many companies simply recolor their logos with the LGBT rainbow palette. It’s a straightforward, effective solution. After many design explorations, I determined this was not going to be a solution that worked for Cisco. No matter how the color was applied, the logo was too busy and, in many instances, unreadable. A different approach was needed.
Using the tines of the Cisco logo, I created a simple, iconic illustration of a heart. The shape and closeness of the tines are to symbolize togetherness. This solution allowed me to present the logo clearly.
Result
The design work was tremendous success. The heart illustration applied to a vast amount of merchandise, including flags, scarves, badges, and more. It also was used globally, appearing at pride parades in London and Tokyo.
It was used so much and so often that it became the logo and identity for Cisco Pride, the global LGBT employee resource organization.
I further developed the identity system by the core elements of the illustration, the tines and color palette, to create a series of pop-up banners for Out for Undergrad, an event being sponsored by Cisco.