Change of Logo:
A Note from Sangeeta Roy

Kala Tarang started its journey in Singapore with a first exhibition in November 2008. Our vision was simple - to be a window to India's craft heritage; and our mission was to promote and sell Indian handicrafts.

As I was grappling with the many things a new business needs, a logo became one thing that proved rather difficult to come up with. There is a sense of permanence and omnipresence about the logo that makes it imperative that we get it mostly right. After many iterations, our then designer came up with the 4 hand-prints in 4 colours. It brought forth the fact that Kala Tarang was associated with a sector where everything was hand-made with natural colors and made perfect sense! The 4 hand-prints became part of all marketing materials, social media, email signatures and the website. The logo has served us well for over a decade and is our identity.

Raashmi, an incredibly gifted designer, became associated with Kala Tarang shortly after the logo was finalised. So, everywhere that you saw the logo, Raashmi was the one who put it there in the most aesthetically pleasing manner!

A few months ago I decided that it was time to make some changes in the presentation of the brand, starting with a new logo. The logo we have now seemed dated and out-of-place with other changes. I, of course, called Raashmi, the person who knows and understands the brand attributes better than I do. She jumped on-board and started ideating the redesign. She instinctively knew what was required. Aah! the benefits of long relationships. The logo needed to be simple, mature-yet-modern while having a hand-made feel to it. Design benefits like ease of incorporation in marketing artwork, websites were needed. Also desired was an ability to work in various sizes and even different colours…phew!

It was an agonising process. Raashmi sent me work-in-progress logos saying she wasn't happy with them so I wasn't allowed to like them (yep…she is her own strongest critic :D). After many many iterations, we zeroed in on our new logo. I loved it at first sight. It ticked all boxes and it worked! The word 'Kala' in our name is often mispronounced. For a little while we were quite tempted to use the Devanagri script in the logo redesign to end the confusion over the pronunciation. Instead, we went with a simple diacritical mark over the second 'A' in the word Kala, which made for a good design element too. The circle ('Bindu') in a shade of terracotta got added to give the logo the look of a block-printed stamp. We deliberately kept the 'Bindu' jagged– edged and imperfect, like our handmade products – unique and perfect in their imperfections. Thank you Raashmi.

Letting go of something is never easy. We are going to miss our old logo but what better time for change when change is upon us in every way. 2020 will be a year of many (albeit unforeseen) changes, so this one should fit right in. We will have to do a few things differently this year and this new logo will lead the way. What will remain unchanged however, is the commitment to traditional crafts, their sustainable processes and artisans who have with them the knowledge to heal our bruised planet. Also unchanged will be our goal to connect them with you – the socially aware consumer who loves, appreciates and are passionate about handmade items and because of whom these beautiful crafts have come this far.