Photo Credit: Zophie Felina

“If I could put a rainbow on every cake I would.”

Oven Lovely’s goal was to have a brand that captured the pure euphoria of eating desserts. As owner Mary McKenna-Johns puts it, “If I could put a rainbow on every cake I would.” During the initial consult, we uncovered key company values to guide our decisions. One value was to ensure customers and employees felt taken care of. And so, the mood board I created was a celebration of the brightness and joy that comes from sharing a dessert with a friend. I saw the brand at the intersection of human goodness and exceptional magic, because the food is so delicious and vegan it’s basically witchcraft. At the same time, we wanted to resist the stereotypical green leaf vegan motif, while still being playful enough to capture both vegan and non-vegan imaginations.

Made with Magic in a Home Kitchen

San Diego County requires cottage license holders to clearly label food as made in a home kitchen. We decided to lean into that sentiment by celebrating the sheer wizardry of baking vegan desserts in a home. The tagline then became: “Made with magic in a home kitchen.” That same wonderment found its way into the logo by treating the whisk like a magic wand. The lettering was hand drawn with a bouncing rhythm to show off Oven Lovely’s playful side, but it was still bold and loud. We wanted to avoid the typical thin line calligraphy motifs by using chunkier lines.

The quirky lines that make up the whisk and the entire design itself are reminiscent of vintage cartoons. One of Mary’s “why” statements was, “Because you never have to grow up.” Oven Lovely desserts have a magic to them that make people feel like a kid watching Saturday morning cartoons again, so I wanted that same cartoon-y feel in a potential mascot. I thought it would drive home the idea of Oven Lovely desserts as magical creatures by adding a unicorn horn.

Packing up the Magic

When it came time for the packaging system, we had a few challenges. Mary had a wide range of magical recipes and wanted the flexibility to create new concoctions often. With ever-changing ingredient lists, it didn’t make sense to order pre-printed labels, so we needed labels that could be printed at home. We also needed a design system that worked for items sold individually and larger batches of custom orders. I experimented with different label sizes that could accommodate all of our box sizes, and came up with a system of four different labels. I turned those labels into Pages templates so that Mary could alter the ingredient lists and print at her leisure.

Services Provided

• Branding and research
• Packaging design and logistics
• Social media identity
• Business card design