Andy Clymer
Recent Work
Play Soccer 2 Give
Play Soccer 2 Give is a New York City based non‑profit that uses local soccer pickup games to fundraise for larger initiatives. Among their many endeavors this year they supported Street Soccer USA’s team at the Homeless World Cup in Mexico City.
My friend Caleb (pictured above) is the National Director at PS2G and he does good in a big way that inspires you to do the same. For example, the time he biked across the country riding 80+ mile days, rolling into the next town along the way to coach pickup games for Street Soccer USA in the evening.
I was having lunch with Caleb a few weekends ago and the topic of the Homeless World Cup came up — he was making preparations to send the team to Mexico this year and among all the things left to prepare they still hadn’t settled on a design for this year’s jersey. The shirts were due to be sent off to the screen printers the following morning (which was a tight turnaround) but I couldn’t pass up an opportunity to give him some quick options. In the end, I’m really happy with how they turned out, and I was really excited to have a chance to help Caleb.
The heart filling the counter space between the “S” and the “2” in Play Soccer 2 Give’s logo is well loved by the organization, so Caleb suggested that this year’s design could be my own interpretation of what they already had.
PS2G’s current logo
I wanted to draw something that was a little bit warmer than their current logo and not follow the purely geometric style that they already had, I wanted to start sketching with a completely different style. I thought that a Latin style with wedges making up the beak of the “S” and “2”, along with vertical stroke endings, could be put to use to help shape the heart in the counter space.
First sketch of the “S”...
...and a quickly drawn lockup of the remaining characters around the heart
It was a good start to get things rolling, but didn’t have the feel that I had in mind. I made a quick revision where I used the Outliner extension in RoboFont to quickly lighten up the logo by offsetting its path.
Quickly eroding the letters away like this wouldn’t result in the “final” outlines, but it’s a quicker way to prototype the adjustment I had in mind than if I were to make the change by hand.
I thought I’d take another shot at it, the weight and proportion felt good but a sans serif with vertical stroke endings and similar proportions could still maintain the heart shape, but would end up with a different feel.
This was closer to what I thought they might go for but I had an idea that brought be back to that Outliner extension in RoboFont. With a couple passes of offsetting the path and a bit of fine-tuning I had something that looked appropriate for a soccer team, and gives a nod to the concentric outlines of the Mexico 1968 Olympics identity by Lance Wyman.
If you’re thinking of making an end of the year donation to a non-profit, I encourage you to have a look at what Play Soccer 2 Give and Street Soccer USA are up to!
— Andy Clymer
December, 2018