Damaso Family Crest

To celebrate Filipino-American History Month in October, I designed a family crest.

Fonts: I really like the calligraphic style of Germania One, and I paired it with Berlin Sans. Overall, the text feels very classic and islandy.

Imagery: The banana tree is a huge part of Filipino culture, so I made the laurels in the shapes of banana leaves. My family is big on cooking (and food in general), so I made that a prominent part of the crest with the caldero icon and "Let's Eat!". Most of the Damasos are based in Los Angeles, so I added the Downtown LA skyline with palm trees, which also mirrors the islands. Lastly, apparently my paternal grandfather swore by Vicks VapoRub's all-healing qualities and used it for everything, so I thought my family would appreciate the humorous homage (I referenced a vintage Vicks jar design for this).

Colors: Choosing just two colors was challenging. For the green, I sampled an image of an LA street lined with palm trees; I thought a darker green would work really well. The yellow is actually sampled from the Filipino flag; I wanted to steer clear of blatant, overused Filipino imagery like the sun from the flag, so I decided to use the sun's color in the crest instead. The warmth of the yellow and the cool of the green complement each other nicely.