One of the first things my neighbour Laia Aguilar (a children’s clothing designer and the creator of the brand Animals Observatory) told me when speaking to her of Bravanariz was this: “I love the name. If you haven’t registered it yet, you are running late.” I was not thinking about going so fast, but that comment alerted me. I did not want to lose the name. The paperwork is easy, but I needed an image to go with it, a logo.
I was clear about what I wanted to do. Ever since I began with the idea I had thought about working with Joan Tarragó, who did the great logo for the Japanese restaurant Nakashita, run by my good friend Nacho Forteza in Barcelona. Since then I have always kept up on what he is doing through his web.
It is easy to get excited when you are working with Joan. He’s an artist, not just your run-of- the-mill designer. He is clear about what he likes, and if it fits with what you propose, everything goes smoothly. Fortunately, he was attracted from the start to the idea of Bravanariz, and speaking with him was very helpful for me to focus in on certain aspects of the brand.
I wanted to distance myself from the classic French style of many aroma brands (including new indie perfumeries) and give it a rougher touch, something wilder but still elegant. Amongst other things I spoke to him about the manual process, the importance of gathering plants in the wild, of the strong presence of rosemary in our landscape, and of Canigó mountain, ever-visible, like an open invitation, from anywhere on my property. Joan captured all of this and got it right from the start (although with a spelling error I found quite amusing, for its association with the brilliant Irish writer and recognized dandy Oscar Wilde).
For now, we are working on various applications, such as labelling stickers for our own use in the laboratory, web applications and embroidery for the headwear we use at work. There is still some way to go before we get to the definitive design of the bottles and packaging, which quite logically will depend on the limitations marked out by the use of ecological ink and recyclable materials.
My overflowing imagination is already thinking of t-shirts, raincoats, metal camping cups—but that, I am told, is like putting the cart before the horse. And I know it’s true. Still, sometimes I have my doubts. Sometimes I think that a good promotional campaign before you start awakens curiosity, creates a bit of a buzz and can help when launching a new product. There are already people asking where I got the cap that appears in all my press and television interviews, no less, which was done for me for all these presentations. The fact is that there are many possibilities and uses for the logo, and it is flexible enough to be able to adapt to all of them.
