Winning Entry · 99designs

Thin Air Adventures

Eco Travel Company Identity

An eco travel company running custom tours through the Tibetan region of the Eastern Himalayas needed a mark as rugged and honest as the Ancient Tea Horse Trail itself — a bold illustrative mountain scene with a lone trekker, rendered in timeless black and white.

IndustryTravel & Hotel

ServiceLogo & Brand Identity

Platform99designs

The Contest Brief

Design a logo for an eco travel company based in Shangri-La, running custom tours through the Eastern Himalayas — something that gives a Tibetan / Mountains vibe.

Thin Air Adventures is an eco travel company headquartered in Shangri-La, Yunnan, China. They run custom tours throughout the Tibetan region in the Eastern Himalayas, with many of their destinations along the Ancient Tea Horse Trail — one of history's oldest trade routes, carved through some of the world's most remote mountain terrain.

The brief called for a logo that felt authentically Himalayan — not a generic mountain icon, but something with real character. The client was open to any colour direction and wanted the design to work across print deliverables (business cards, letterheads, brochures) and online formats (website, advertising, banners). The overriding note: “a logo that gives a Tibetan / Mountains vibe would be splendid.”

Design Requirements

Name to incorporate: 'Thin Air Adventures'

Eco travel company based in Shangri-La, Yunnan, China — Eastern Himalayas tours

Many destinations on the Ancient Tea Horse Trail

Industry: Travel & Hotel

Colour: Designers choose — open to creativity

Style: Slightly modern, slightly organic, slightly literal — Tibetan / Mountains vibe

Deliverables: Print (business cards, letterheads, brochures) and online (website, advertising, banners)

Design Exploration

Sketches, concepts, and the directions that didn't make it

Initial Sketches & Concept Exploration

Concept Direction 01 — Illustrative Mountain Mark

Concept Direction 02 — Emblem / Badge Approach

Rejected Explorations

The Final Mark

The mountain, the trail, the spirit of the journey.

Symbol

A detailed mountain silhouette anchors the mark — jagged Himalayan peaks, a lone trekker ascending with a walking stick, pine trees, and birds in flight. The scene is dense with narrative but reads instantly at any size, from a business card to a trail banner.

Typography

Add font name — 'thin air' is set in a bold, rounded lowercase that contrasts the ruggedness of the illustration with approachable warmth. 'ADVENTURES' sits below in wide-tracked small caps, grounding the mark with authority.

Colour

Finalised in black and white — a deliberate choice for maximum versatility. The monochrome palette ensures the mark holds equally well on light or dark backgrounds, across print and digital formats, with no colour dependency.

Logo System