The Sapphire Hotel
project: Logo
design: Matt Moore

The Sapphire Hotel was in desperate need for a logo. They had tried a few over the years but none of them really stuck. They had always cultivated that Oscar Wylde, drunken sailor, old world port vibe but trying to incorporate it into a logo had proven a challenge. None of the off-the-shelf Art Nouveau fonts available felt sincere or conveyed the uniqueness of the place. I wanted to capture that but I also wanted to embody some of the "old Portland" that the native Portlanders were seeing disappear at an alarming rate. The Sapphire Hotel is one of the few places that still feels like Portland. I wanted to celebrate that.

After exploring this problem I started putting pencil to paper and developed the font I couldn't find anywhere but my brain. Finally something felt right... to me at least. I put it through the paces and made sure it jumped through the right hoops. Does it work in one color without gradations? Yes. Does it reduce well and play well with others? Yes. And so on. When I felt it was ready I pitched it to the clients. They loved it. We think this logo has found a forever home. Cheers!