Bjorklunds Sweden was founded by entrepreneur and passionate coffee enthusiast Johan Bjorklund in 2013 in Vasteras. The mission was to show his city how great coffee could and should taste. The company culture expressed itself devotedly around the inherent value of joy, specifically that which comes from a damn good coffee.

My clients wanted to narrow in on this kind of appreciation of subtlety.

After the initiation calls, a theme that emerged was the value of stillness, and the space required to contemplate clearly. They were also really interested in bringing in the cultural practice of the afternoon coffee breaks to Korea through their cafe.

After some experimentation with subtle adjustments to the wordmark we opted instead for a symbol-type logo, arriving at an understated concept of a sunset reflected in the water— a simple shape that could hold the ideas of:

• The seeking of a clear vision
• The value of stillness
• The associations with the afternoon

We paired this with a typeface similar to the original but with spacing modified for a modern and luxury-grade look to counterbalance all the soft, organic edges of the symbol. Contextual mockups were generated to show the symbol in action.

The Bjorklunds team had a brilliant in-house graphic designer with his own strong sense of identity for the brand. We collaborated on a moodboard to establish the cafe’s interior tones and menu/typeface styles. We opted for tones that felt natural, quiet, and shaded.

Once the visual anchors were in place, they ran with it pretty hard.

Sometimes No Process = The Process

This was one of a few projects, where the clients fell in love with one of the first ideas before I got deep into my creative process. After enough sitting with their visions of what their cafe would feel like, the concept arose rather organically and they trusted their instincts when they saw the first idea.