Portland Common
Portland Common Football Club is a fictional USL League One brand designed to highlight the community and identity of Portland, Maine.
You can view the original brand presentation here.
PORTLAND COMMON.
ANYTHING BUT.
Portland Common Football Club is a club built exclusively around the community of Portland, Maine. Founded as an amateur club, the side quickly amassed a local following, made the jump to the professional ranks, and built a community first soccer stadium in the heart of their downtown.
The Portland Common identity was designed to put Portland first in every aspect, and highlight the club motto of “Club. Community. Common Ground.”. Careful consideration was paid in finding and creating graphic elements that were instantly recognizable to the city of Portland Maine.
CLUB. COMMUNITY.
COMMON GROUND.
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The Common identity was created as part of a graphic design class taken while pursuing my masters at UW-Madison. Originally the idea was to create a small, niche business and brand, but after discussion with my professor, I was green-lit to create a unique, local soccer club with a story that made it more akin to a popular local brewery than a soccer team.
When originally undertaking the project, I started with hundreds of sketches, attempting to keep the “C” shape at the center of the badge. Tons of the original sketches ended up without any kind of border, and looked more like a niche crafts shop than a soccer logo. While I wasn’t opposed to a non-traditional crest, I did think it was important to make the logo instantly recognizable as a “sports” mark, especially considering the prominent role a badge serves in a clubs identity. Still, keeping traditional elements such as a soccer ball away from the logo was important to me. The mark should scream Portland, not soccer.
Through revision, I ended up with three key elements I wanted to include in the badge. A lone pine tree, taken from the original flag of Portland, Maine, a star, again from the flag, and the bold “C”, to stand for the clubs guiding principles of “Club. Community. Common Ground.”
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Portland’s primary mark was designed to instantly be recognizable to the citizens of Portland Maine as a symbol of their city.
At it’s heart sits three key elements, a “PC” for Portland Common, the name and location of the club, the “FC” identifier to identify the badge as clearly a soccer crest, and a lone pine tree, taken from the original flag of Portland Maine, a city icon.
The pine is placed at the center of the badge, to indicate Portland, and its community sits at the heart of the Common, and the heart of the club. The FC modifier sits unobtrusively within the “PC” to indicate that yes, it is a football club, but that’s far from the most important function of the club.
The Common name runs across the badge at an angle, visually guiding the eye to the four pointed star at the top right of the badge. The star mimics the position of the five pointed star found on the original Portland flag, allowing for additional visual comparisons between the badge, and the iconic symbol of Portland Maine. The four pointed star also serves as a nod to the four names of Portland throughout its history, Casco, Machigonne, Falmouth, and Portland.
At the base of the badge sits the word “Resurgam”, the Motto of the city, and unofficial motto of the club. The latin phrase means “I will rise again” and is a nod to the multiple times Portland has been rebuilt after tragic fires.
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The Common has two secondary marks. A simplified version of the primary crest for a variety of usages across club branding, and a “Signal Flag” mark for use as an accent across club merchandise and communication.
The Signal Flag mark is comprised of the primary “C” mark, and the two nautical flags for “P” and “F”, so that the mark contains all the visual signifiers to be read as “PCFC”
