The American Royal is a non-profit organization based in Kansas City since 1899, which holds the world’s largest barbecue competition each year. The American Royal World Series of Barbecue® has live music, kids’ activities, and a vendor fair in addition to the prestigious barbecue competition, and takes place over 3 days at the Kansas Speedway.

In 2019, I was tasked to design 4 t-shirts to be sold at the event: the main event shirt, a military appreciation shirt, a shirt for teens and one for kids.

Main Event

Military Appreciation

On the Saturday of the competition, there was a special military appreciation event. American Royal wanted a military/patriotic t-shirt design, so I came up with an american flag design that substituted barbecue tools for the stripes of the flag. The back features the event name and sponsor, and the sleeves feature the American Royal logo and a service stripe-styled graphic.

Teen

For the teen shirt, my teammate and I had noted the rising popularity of 1970s graphics. I designed a scene with an open grill, a picnic table setting, and sunshine, with the playful slogan: “You had me at barbecue”. I chose a retro color palette and used a typeface with fat letterforms reminiscent of 1970s typography.

Youth

Together with a writer from my creative team, we came up with a fun phrase for the kids’ shirt. I designed this lockup using fun and stylized typography, and then illustrated the ornamentation and chose four different bright and playful color palettes for this design.