Rochester Retro Redesign (#5 - Knighthawks Lax - Series done)

[chestnutz]

Hey y'all, I'm back with a project I've been cooking up on and off for several years. And I finally had some time to finish it up!

 

This is a rebranding project for 5 of my hometown teams from Rochester, NY. They're very mid-century, simple (and hopefully timeless) designs that fly in the face of what usually comes to mind when you think of minor league branding.

 

First up, the Rochester Red Wings.

 

Y'all may remember nearly 3 years ago (!!!) when I first posted this. Since then, I've kept some ideas and redone others, but as a whole the concept is largely the same. The Wings are the oldest continuously operating non-major sports team in America, starting in 1899. Yet in the 90's, they went full on black-for-blacks-sake, and it's always crushed me, even as a kid going to games. So we're doing away with ALL black, all colors except for RED, and trying to give them a classic look that befits a team of its age.

 

I'll start off with some of the inspiration behind the logos, uniforms, and overall brand.

 

 

As you'll see throughout the series, I've come up with a lot of logos for each team, and while there are ones that are more "primary", I haven't really gone and specified primary/secondary/tertiary, etc. Just kind of throwing all my ideas at the wall really.

 

That said, here are the main logos. A flying ball in profile that makes a subtle R, serving primarily as the cap logo, and another ball & wings logo that's inspired by the Times Square Building in downtown, probably the city's most iconic skyline landmark that you can see from the ballpark, with its giant steel "wings of progress."

 

 

This little grid showcases most of the assets, including the home and away uniforms. They both take inspiration from the team's classic mid-century uniforms, going for a super 60s/70s look.

 

 

A couple of roundels here. For each team in the series I've made a "Flower City" badge to pay homage to the city's logo and nickname. And if there was a tertiary logo, it would be this little homeplate bird, because what's a Red Wings team brand without an actual bird.

 

 

And lastly, showing off the home uniform is a little baseball card boy, because I couldn't help add some illustration in there.

 

 

Cheers, hope y'all dig it! I'll probably post a new team every few days or so.

[raysox]

what an absolutely beautiful set. I adore your style and think this is such a unique concept. The R-ball and R-wings that mimic the building are especially class.

[chestnutz]

Thanks so much man, really appreciate it! Excited to share more of this project.

[chestnutz]

Moving onto the next team, the Rochester Rattlers.

 

The Rattlers were one of the founding members of Major League Lacrosse in 2001. They were a decently big deal back in the day when I was a kid (though not compared to the winter-league Knighthawks), as western NY loves their lacrosse. I don't actually know that much about lax, so this was fun to research a bit, particularly how the uniforms work. They never really had a good identity though, as the logos were extremely dated. They moved onto Dallas a few years ago, which is a shame, but I brought 'em back for this project!

 

First up are the main logos, just a bunch of snake variations. As you'll see in the set, I opted for a diamond/hexagon pattern motif throughout the identity.

 

 

Then we've got the Flower City badge, which might be my favorite of the bunch. And the wordmarks, one super simple ROC on the away jersey and a full Rattlers for the home. Lots of rattlesnake rattlers throughout!

 

 

Here is the full set together, including the uniforms. Relatively simple, again just repeating that diamond/hexagon pattern as trim. The helmet features the striking snake wrapping into the bottom.

 

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And of course, gotta model the uniform!

 

[chestnutz]

Next up, the Rochester Raging Rhinos.

 

I'm sure many of you know the history of the Rhinos in Rochester, but here's a refresher in case you don't: founded in 1996, the Rhinos were THE team in Rochester at the turn of the century, and growing up they were my favorite games to go to in town. They packed the stadium and dominated their league, even winning the US Open Cup in '99, becoming the first and still only non-MLS team to do so (which is represented in my concept by a star above the badge). 

 

Sadly they hit some rough times, and along with their financial and ownership issues, have always had a crisis of identity, first dropping the "Raging" from the name, and then going full rebrand a few years back with the Jamie Vardy-led ownership into Rochester NYFC. So I brought back the Raging Rhinos, embracing the cheesiness of American naming systems. 

 

 

For this set, I was inspired by those late 90's looks, the stripes at home and yellow shirt away were always my favorites. I took inspiration from their classic, super 90's ball-in-horn logo, with a super simplified retro take. A full bodied is also used, again drawing inspo from their rebranded logo of the 2000s. These serve as the two primary logos.

 

 

Some additional lockups here, with full text, the Flower City badge, and a wordmark.

 

 

And here's the full set including the uniforms. Again pretty simple and about as classy as a team with the name Raging Rhinos can be I think!

 

Lastly, our little guys modeling the kits!

 

 

Thanks for lookin!

[chestnutz]

Next up, the AHL's Rochester Americans.

 

Quite a storied franchise in the AHL and still pretty popular in the city (though not as much in the past), the Amerks have hardly touched their brand since their founding in 1956. As such, this set strays the least from their established branding out of all the teams in this series. 

 

It's a whole lot of stars and stripes! Here's a look at the inspiration behind the set. I did my own take on modernizing (or retrofying?) their primary script and crest, as well as taking inspiration from a short-lived alternate featuring two hockey sticks that form the top of a star. 

 

 

 

A few alternate logos and explorations of the brand:

 

 

And the full set, featuring more brand exploration and the uniforms. Pretty simple, playing into the red and white stripes and blue stars theme as one would expect. The Flower City roundel for this set obviously uses a star to represent the flower, with the blue background petals looking closest to the actual City of Rochester logo in the entire series, and with a simplified puck in the middle.

 

 

Lastly, a little Amerk modeling the away uniform!

 

[chestnutz]

Okay last one...it's another lacrosse team, yay! The Rochester Knighthawks have been around since 95, playing indoors (vs the Rattlers outdoor) in the winter at the same spot as the Amerks, the Blue Cross Arena. They've been a pretty successful franchise, and were certainly the most popular lax team in the area.

 

 

They sadly rebranded away from the purple and teal recently into a very meh military green (though their R monogram is nice). For my concept, the primary logo is a super simplified monoline version of their old diagonal/diving hawk. I wanted to parallel that same kind of motion in the logo. For the rest, I focused in on the "knight" (sword), the "night" (moon), and the "hawk" (bird!), so ya know, I've got all the bases covered lol.

 

 

The home uniform takes inspiration from their classic NY Rangers-esque lettering going down the jersey. It's too much of a classic to stray from, but put my own spin on things with the black and teal stripes throughout. The Flower City roundel uses feathers and is actually the only one in the series with 6 pedals - I kind of liked the snowflake look to signify that they were Rochester's winter lax team. The team usually used teal for their alternate jerseys, but I wanted to go all in on black and make them hawks of the (k)night!

 

 

And here is that black uni in action!

 

 

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And with that, the series is finished! Thanks for stopping by throughout y'all, any comments or feedback would be much appreciated!

[vtgco]

Absolutely gorgeous work here! Definitely love a city-wide running motif and the variations on flower logos are a nice touch to that end. I think the Rattlers' version is my favorite of those; probably the best individual logo of the series IMO.

 

Love to see the return of the Rhinos; I especially like that vaguely shield-shaped logo for them. Would be curious to see that crest with "Rochester" replacing the "Raging" text. I do love the way the "Rhinos" R & "Raging" g combine in the cursive script wordmark though! And the jerseys are excellent; only suggestion would be green number at home instead of yellow.

 

For the Knighthawks, the purple logo on the black jersey is a bit tough contrast-wise; I'd maybe have the wordmark on the black jersey instead.

Of course, that full moon + hawk roundel logo is gorgeous and could probably the front crest everywhere IMO. 

Also, I would be curious to see the Knighthawks in their current colors and/or in black+purple without teal+white (not that you chose it, but purple + teal isn't my favorite combo.)

 

Amerks look great too; the upright logo is a big improvement and the USA-ified flower is quite clever.

 

I do think your Red Wings flower logo is a big improvement from your earlier version of the concept, and works well as the main sleeve patch. I like the inspiration but tI kinda think the execution of the wings on this new Golden Snitch logo on the white jersey are a bit oversimplified to fit in with the rest of the set. TBH I'd rather just see the "Red Wings" wordmark or the cap logo at home.

 

Anyways, excellent work, per usual!

[chestnutz]

Thanks for the thoughtful feedback @vtgco! All very fair points, I agree the Rattlers one might be my favorite of the bunch (and maybe set me up for failure in the future ones, lol!) Appreciate your insight and you confirmed a lot of things I was thinking about!

[jdavidev]

An all-Rochester concept thread? Have I been wishing really hard lately?

 

Love it all, the Red Wings especially. The faster they can get away from the big chicken logo and wear something more respectable, the better. And yours is gorgeous.

 

The Amerks is great, through I was never a fan of the triangle/sticks logo.

[OchentaYOcho88]

Every one of the Flower City logos are amazing.

Your presentation is so charming too, really really like looking at these. Beautiful. 

[chestnutz]

On 5/17/2023 at 3:47 PM, jdavidev said:

An all-Rochester concept thread? Have I been wishing really hard lately?

 

Love it all, the Red Wings especially. The faster they can get away from the big chicken logo and wear something more respectable, the better. And yours is gorgeous.

 

The Amerks is great, through I was never a fan of the triangle/sticks logo.

 lol the ROC never gets the attention it (maybe?) deserves! The Wings brand has been frustrating for as long as I can remember! Never wanted to wear their gear even as a kid haha

 

1 hour ago, OchentaYOcho88 said:

Every one of the Flower City logos are amazing.

Your presentation is so charming too, really really like looking at these. Beautiful. 

 Thanks so much! It was a fun challenge coming up with different branded ways to do the flower