Canada Foundation for Nepal - Official Logo
When the organization started, it's main focus was to bring about prosperity, democracy, peace, and justice to Nepal. The challenge in designing a logo was to make it meaningful while displaying the name or acronym of the organization. My goal was to incorporate a subtle, yet familiar Nepalese element into the logo. Nepal's flag is a unique flag with two triangles that features a sun, a moon, and the colours red, white, and blue. I chose to use the sun and moon motif to create the C of CFFN. The next challenge was how to represent organization's mission and goals as well. That's where I chose to use the yellow sun to depict a brighter future, with rays of hope reaching up and out. The waning crescent moon will eventually become a new moon, where there will be no red colour. No conflict. The C was later added as text because some people thought the organization's Web site was ffn.ca, not cffn.ca.
Though the organization's focus has shifted toward improving educational systems in remote rural areas, the sun and moon motif still contributes the idea that education lasts forever, like the heavenly bodies.
Evolution
The logo started as simple lettering with the acronym and Web address for the organization. A blue colour scheme was originally pursued.
A number of colour schemes were tested after I chose to go with the moon motif from Nepal's national flag.
As the moon form's role takes a more dominant role in the logo, the logo itself becomes more dynamic. It begins to show movement, which is also symbolic of the organization itself. However, at this stage, using the moon as the C in the organization's name becomes challenging, as people no longer associate the symbol with the lettering.
The colour scheme and basic design is finalized. This particular iteration was used for print purposes and even online. A bevelled version with three dimensional effects was created for stronger effects and to use in high quality materials.