MAENIC
This branding project centers on MAENIC, a fashion brand rooted in myth, ritual, and transformation. Built in collaboration with apparel designer Payton Thurber, the brand draws from the tension between solidity and frenzy, stone and ecstasy, refusal and release. MAENIC explores how clothing can function as both armor and expression, merging gothic, fairy-tale, and witchcraft influences into a sensual, body-aware visual language.
The identity is driven by contrast. A deep burgundy anchors the system and references stone, ritual, and grounding, while electric cyan cuts through as a disruptive accent that signals mania, motion, and emotional intensity. This push and pull shapes the brand’s visual world and creates a sense of constant becoming rather than stability.
At the center of the system is a flexible logo and monogram pairing. The wordmark acts as a grounded core, while the monogram can be stretched, repeated, and layered as a decorative element across layouts. Used together, they allow the identity to shift between restraint and excess, appearing carved and stable in some contexts, then fractured, multiplied, or glitched in others. This modularity supports playfulness and variation across garments, motion, digital, and print applications.
Building from these elements, the identity expands into typography, motion tests, and layout systems that intentionally interrupt structure. Grids slip, type overlaps, and visuals pulse between control and chaos, reflecting MAENIC’s underlying ethos of ritual, refusal, and ecstatic presence.
