Everdine’s, a family-owned restaurant known for “handcrafted” grilled cheese sandwiches, is one of our team’s favorite lunchtime haunts. Taking that same made-from-scratch spirit that customers love about Everdine’s, we created a new logo concept and website design aimed at better translating the restaurant’s appeal.
To establish an aesthetic that marries the company's specialized, handmade sensibility while communicating their signature product.
We married modern typography and simple graphical elements that read well at any size with hand-drawn illustrations that underscore Everdine's "made-with-care" nature.
The logo, branding elements and website design bring Everdine's into the 21st century while keeping their tailor-made personality intact.
The rubber-stamp texture used on the branding elements conveys the durable, “vintage” aesthetic that is appropriate for an established business operating with an old-school vibe. The simple, stylized “flame” graphic suggests the sizzle of the griddle and serves as a scalable, easy-to-read mark to be used in instances where there isn’t room to fit the full logo.
With grilled cheese the star of the show here, we explored a variety of concepts based around the tools and ingredients used in making it. We also experimented with different typography treatments and other mark options during our initial work.
We wanted Everdine’s website to take the visual style established in the branding elements and extend it to tell more of the restaurant’s story and spur potential customers to visit, eat, and buy merchandise. The combination of photography and hand-drawn illustration presents a lively, offbeat feel that shows off the food and experience of eating at Everdine’s.
We created an entirely new front-end design experience with type, illustrations, color blocks and photography. Below are a couple of the page highlights.
The menu page utilizes strong, clear type hierarchy to guide the user’s eye through the information, carrying through the same angled, layered visual style established on the home page. The illustrations offer useful information (“Melissa’s Pick” and “Moses’ Pick”) as well as adding unmistakable Everdine’s flavor.
This feature helps elevate the project from a standard brochure-style marketing piece to a delicious interactive experience, giving the user the chance to “make” their own grilled cheese sandwich online and see how much it would cost.
The hand-drawn, line-style illustrations throughout give the site a custom feel, not unlike the made-to-order sandwiches served at the restaurant.
While we could have opted for a standard Google map, Everdine’s story is too fun and unique for “standard.” Our designer created an illustrative map that is both helpful to the user and perfectly in step with the vintage feel of the rest of the website.
The finished work neatly toes the line between classic appeal and a friendly, quirky spirit, capturing the voice of one of Naperville’s most beloved eateries.
