Faceout gets a Facelift!

Once upon a time I was a newly minted designer with a shot at a pretty cool job…book cover designer. After landing the job, I was soon making regular trips to Barnes & Noble to get inspired by the work of other book cover designers, and to hunt for designs by our team out in the wild. Whenever I would spot one of our book designs featured face out on a shelf, it felt good. Most books are arranged side-by-side with only the spine showing. The first time I saw one of my own designs face out, I did a little happy dance in the aisle. So when we decided to look for a new name for the studio, Faceout was born. It captured that idea of standing out on a crowded book shelf, and also of looking outward and forward toward bright possibilities.

But all of that facing out can make it hard to look in the mirror. Somewhere along the line, Spencer called it out and said ”we need a new logo and website like yesterday”. Everyone agreed. So we got to work. Pretty soon it became clear we would need the whole team to participate. We scheduled a full day for everyone to pause client work and focus exclusively on sketches for a new Faceout brand identity. I made 2 things very clear in the creative brief. 1) We would stick with our signature red color, and 2) No book themed logos. There are a multitude of book logos out there in publishing. We would do something else.

We pinned up hundreds of sketches on the conference room wall, and went old school with a crit wall evaluation of sorts. We all ranked our favorites, wrestled with the merits, narrowed the choices and went back to finesse those selections. And we ended up with…a book themed logo! And we’re all excited about it! The letters are playful and the look is sort of mid century with a contemporary twist. It’s a fun and engaging celebration of the printed book in all of its glory, standing confidently, face out. May it ever be so. 

Some of you are clients, some are studio friends. We’re so grateful for all of you. Thanks for celebrating with us!  

Tim Green
Creative Director
Faceout Studio