Sports: Apex City Football Club
Apex City Football Club is a newly established professional team preparing for its inaugural season in the Premier League. This brief outlines the requirements for creating a comprehensive, modern brand identity from scratch. Our goal is to build a brand identity that honors the deep industrial roots of our city while positioning the club as a forward-thinking, community-first organization. The final visual assets must command a powerful presence on the pitch, across digital media, and on merchandise.
Brand personality
The Apex City brand identity must be anchored by three core pillars:
Resilience: A nod to the communities working class culture. The visuals should feel strong, grounded, and unyielding.
Innovation: We are a modern club utilising data-driven analytics and sustainable community practices. The design should feel sleek and contemporary, avoiding overused "retro" football clichés.
Inclusivity: A club for everyone. The brand must be accessible, welcoming, and easily adopted by a diverse fan base.
Visual identity requirements
Club Crest
The crest is the heart of the club's identity. It must be highly versatile, scalable, and instantly recognizable.
Format: The primary crest must function perfectly as a physical embroidery patch on a kit, a small digital favicon, and a massive stadium graphic
Symbolism: Designers should subtly integrate the city’s landmark suspension bridge or a stylized geometric "A" representing the apex
Style: Clean, flat vector design with bold outlines. Avoid intricate gradients or overly detailed illustrative elements that degrade at small sizes
Color Palette
The color system should balance striking on-pitch visibility with lifestyle wearability.
Primary: Industrial iron (dark charcoal or black) representing strength and the city's past
Secondary: Electric sulphur (vibrant green or yellow) — representing energy, future, and high visibility under stadium floodlights
Accent: Pitch white for clean typographic contrast
Typography
Primary Display: A custom or heavily modified geometric sans-serif typeface for player names, kit numbers, and stadium signage. It must feel athletic and commanding
Secondary Body: A clean, highly readable neutral sans-serif for digital applications, matchday programs, and press releases.
Deliverables and application
The final design package must include a comprehensive style guide detailing the following applications:
Crest kit: Primary crest, secondary simplified icon (for merchandise/monochrome use), and typography lockups
Digital assets: App interfaces, broadcast motion graphics, and social media template for individual players
Kit integration: Concept layouts for the cubs home shirt (Primary Charcoal) and away shirt (Primary Sulphur)
Environmental graphics: Stadium boarding and training ground signage
Project timeline
Concept exploration (3 Weeks): Mood boards and a distinct creative direction
Refinement (2 Weeks): Fine-tuning of the crest and colors
Asset delivery (2 Weeks): Asset pack handover
This timeline is a rough guide based on the projects we have previously completed for clients. We have included it as a guide to illustrate the demands of commercial design but we don’t expect you to religiously follow this.
Success metric
The final brand identity must feel modern, relatable and dynamic. Picture it on the teams kit and how it engages with people on social media.
Submissions
If you would like feedback on your work complete the form below. You can submit a PDF to show your thinking or a short video explaining how you tackled the brief. Our team will review and respond as soon as possible.
