Known for its world-famous waffles, JJ's Diner has been a staple for the citizens of Pawnee, IN since opening in 1976. With the merger of Pawnee and Eagleton, JJ's Diner has revolutionized its identity design to draw in new customers without ostracizing loyal patrons, including Regional Director of National Park Service Leslie Knope.
JJ's Diner © NBC ("Parks and Recreation)
Art © Sara Wasserboehr
Waffle photograph © Young Sok Yun
Preliminary Work / Brainstorming:
The new JJ's Diner brand needs to draw in customers both familiar and unfamiliar with the JJ's experience. I started with a list of words that define the diner: comfortable, inviting, dependable, trustworthy, local, and authentic. Using those words, I developed a moodboard:
Then moved forward with sketching:
Logo exploration in Illustrator. Incorporating the waffle really helped seperate JJ's Diner from other diners. I also needed to make sure the JJ's Diner logo looked different from the Jimmy John's logo:
Menu design exploration. The one page approach keeps it simple vs what you might find at other diners:
Website exploration for the iPhone and iPad:
