combo plate convention
There is an active aquarium keeping hobby, not just in the United States, but all over the world. Several conventions, mostly focusing on one aspect of the hobby happen world-wide, drawing people with a common set of interests together for, generally, a long weekend.
The Madison Area Aquatic Hobbyists has held a convention focusing on keeping tropical catfish every two years since 2015. Another group, The American Cichlid Association, has an annual convention. The two groups decided to combine their conventions in 2023.
The convention theme and name, The Combo Plate, paid homage to the Wisconsin tradition of the Friday night fish fry. All of the branding element supported the theme and had a supper club feel.
The event logo incorporated the feel of a supper club era sign. The two fish represented a catfish and a cichlid in reference two the two convention topics. The fish characters were also rendered in an 1950's early 60's style, again, inline with the height of the supper club style of restaurant. I drew the fish characters, scanned the drawings and then used the pen tool to trace the sketches.
The event had a "Fish Show." Similar to a dog show, the fish are judged by conformation to an ideal. There are various divisions, mostly based on geography and classes based on species. The division and class were listed on the top and the person or people who sponsored the award were listed on the bottom. We used restaurant plates which looked period and had them custom made.
The tie-dye t-shirts went off theme a bit because they were popular in the mid to late 60s. It was meant to bring water to mind, however, and a poll of registered participants indicated that most preferred this pattern over a plain shirt.
Pint glasses were offered for sale as momentos to remember the event.
