Desert drama: Jesús López’s identity for CHAMP hotel feels “almost like a non-scripted documentary” — The Brand Identity – Home of the Greatest in Graphic & Brand Design

The story of the boutique hotel, CHAMP, is tied to its location in many ways. To begin with, it’s based in the city of Hermosillo in Mexico and sits on a street called Campodónico, which gets its name from recognised waltz composer Rodolfo Campodónico, born in the city in 1866. The hotel, in keeping with the idea, also draws its name from Campodónico, who was lovingly nicknamed ‘Champ.’ On the other hand, the significance of its location is felt even during the shortest of stays at CHAMP, which celebrates the desert, the city, the local spirit and Sonoran traditions. To distil the many stories that led to the making of the hotel into one comprehensive identity, CHAMP collaborated with Sonora-based designer Jesús López.

When López began thinking about the identity, he leaned towards a typographic route. The fact that the house where CHAMP is located was built in the ’70s provided further food for thought, resulting in the choice of a slightly modified version of the typeface Galey, its retro slant aptly underpinning the hotel’s history. “I selected Galey because it’s elegant and austere at the same time, like the desert,” says López. A trio of typefaces – Saa Series, Century 725 and Helvetica – support the wordmark across the identity, made more interesting by López’s stylistic treatment of the type.

In visiting cards and letterheads, the type appears almost as if hand-stamped on the paper; the text never aligned correctly, and almost always off-centre, or slightly askew. “I wanted to make it look organic and personal; intimate, the opposite of pixel-perfect and digital,” explains López. “I also wanted it to look crafty, with a lot of character, to complement the cosiness and the casual personality of the hotel.”

The candid and retro touch is heightened by López’s use of imagery from old postcards, or photos found in “basements and thrift shops,” which are set against muted colours redolent of the desert and its “light blue skies in the dusk and dawn, the dirt, the stones,” says the designer. The noise-y, scanned-in texture of the photos takes the brand to a place where “high-production and posed images” definitely couldn’t, as López remarks. “It feels almost like a non-scripted documentary,” he adds. “I wanted the identity to be able to travel back in time a little.”