JetPens Interview – An Inside Look at Logos with Specialist Matt Vergotis
An interview series featuring notable people within the pen, art, and design worlds. Matt Vergotis is a talented Logo & Corporate Identity specialist and the founder of VERG, based on the Gold Coast, Australia. He has a simple philosophy on life and that’s to “do the things you love to do.”
image courtesy of Matt Vergotis
Please tell us about yourself and what you do.
I’m Matt Vergotis from the Gold Coast of Australia. I specialize in corporate identity. A lot of the work I do focuses around logo design, but I’m always trying to educate clients that there’s more at play than just their logo when acquiring a solid visual identity for their company. I have also found a new love in both lettering and typeface design. Outside of work I’m an ultra obsessed surf nerd and I’m married with two of the most adorable little girls.
How did VERG come about?
image courtesy of Matt Vergotis
I decided to go out on my own after many years in the industry and focus solely in the area of Corporate Identity. Being passionate about logos and the bigger identity picture that goes with it, I wanted the chance to explore all the wonderful styles and opportunities that come with receiving different and varied briefs. As an in-house Creative Director for 9 years previously, I got a little tired of only nurturing one single company’s brand.
What are the top 3 steps in capturing a business or person’s identity?
image courtesy of Matt Vergotis
1. Understand your client
So much effort has to go into understanding a client brief. The moment you take a shortcut here, you leave yourself wide open to failure, even if you do present a killer visual identity that looks amazing. For me, getting inside the client’s head with a series of questions and Skype chats is my first step.
2. Research and conceptualize
Then doing the appropriate research and conceptualizing until that magic moment when something comes together and you undoubtedly know you’re on to something that works.
image courtesy of Matt Vergotis
3. Presentation in context
Lastly, but equally important, is presenting your concept in context. Going that extra mile to wow your client and present real life examples of how their identity works and how you came to the conclusion. Clients need to visualize how it works in order for them to get it sometimes. It’s an exciting time for clients and when they see a roll-out of collateral, branded with their new look, – it makes their new venture real. I only ever present one concept to clients, so I have to be very certain and back myself that I’ve done the appropriate research and answered the client’s requirements.
Do you have any upcoming projects or events we should look out for?
image courtesy of Matt Vergotis
I have just finished my first working font, Knubi that will be available for download here this week. With most logos I create, I design the typeface, but I recently decided to take it one step further and design the full alphabet as an exercise to better my knowledge in typeface design. Designing typefaces for logos is one thing, but then pulling it all together for a set of lowercase, uppercase, numbers, symbols, glyphs etc is another. It was quite a challenge, but I’m thrilled I saw it out and I can’t wait to work on my next font which should be a lot easier now that I know how to address some of the teething problems I had when creating Knubi.
What are your top favorite JetPens tools and why?
For the past year, I have had my best results with some of the harder-tipped brush pens like the Pilot Pocket brush pen and the super fine Zebra Disposable Brush Pen for some of the lettering projects I’ve been working on. However, I’m trying to become more comfortable with the softer-tip brush pens and I recently bought the Kuretake No. 13 Fountain brush pen, which I’ve been filling pages practicing.
Some of Matt’s favorite JetPens tools:
Since it has so affected your work, please share your philosophy on life.
image courtesy of Matt Vergotis
It’s such a cliché, but I really do love my job. I try to infuse the love of my job in every project and I am also very passionate about delivering outcomes that my clients love too. If they don’t love it, I’m not satisfied and I try and work until I achieve that for them. Simplifying my life to only focus on the things I love to do has been something that’s just naturally happened over the last few years. I love work, I love surfing and I love my family. So I just try to do those three things the best I can.
image courtesy of Matt Vergotis
image courtesy of Matt Vergotis