Backbone Branding – Cafe Diego

While creating a brand for Cafe Diego, the guiding star was the spirit of Argentina.
As festive as his native country, Diego Armando Maradona became the main character and the core on which the brand identity is constructed. The inspiration of the brand is expressed through its colors and Diego’s illustrated portrait. Celebrating the colorful Argentinian backstreets, architecture and street art in the poor districts, we have illustrated Diego’s portrait in that style as well.
Developed to be a take away cafe, the essence of the brand is mostly expressed in the medias of the brand identity, with its black & white and colorful elements. The packaging is specifically developed for take away, as it is so self-sufficient to live out of the café but at the same time also talks about its identity and its appurtenance to Cafe Diego. Comprising a big part in the identity the stenciled head of Diego Maradona and the logo are the commonly placed identity elements on the medias. We also took the newspapers pages with articles about the legendary football player and injected them into the brand identity as media.
We were challenged not to design a football fans club as a result, but show something typical for this country and present Diego as a part of Argentina, to create a place to enjoy nonalcoholic beer and tasty food while watching another football match.
Located in Abu Dhabi, Cafe Diego was developed to create a small Argentina there, with its essence and the spirit we enriched it with.