Design System

Physical design

Digital rules, physical goods.

The defense-industry physical-goods space is full of specific failure modes. This section is as much about what FDT doesn’t make as what it does.

Principles (physical)

  1. Matte over glossy. All finishes - cards, coins, drinkware, apparel tags, sticker stock - default to matte. Gloss reads as cheap event swag.
  2. Single-color prints where possible. A navy shirt with an electric-blue hex mark beats a navy shirt with a four-color scene. One ink, full confidence.
  3. Placement is restrained. Left chest, back of collar, bottom corner of a sticker. Never centered-chest, never full-back unless it’s a dedicated art piece, never sleeves AND chest AND back.
  4. The hex mark is reserved. Wordmarks do the day-to-day work - FDT, GRIDWATCH, GHOST GRID, QRF. The geometric hex mark appears alone on identity objects (badges, coins, dedicated mark stickers) and in hero moments. Not on every item.
  5. No costume. FDT makes defense technology. It doesn’t sell combat theater. Physical goods inherit this - if an item would look at home on a mall-ninja table at a gun show, it doesn’t exist in this system.

ID badges

Employee, contractor, and visitor credentials. PVC card, 85.6 × 54mm (ISO/IEC 7810 ID-1), portrait or landscape. Lanyard loop punched top-center for landscape, top-corner for portrait.

Tiers are color-coded by a 4mm top stripe:

Tier Stripe color Label
Employee electric-500 FDT
Contractor steel-400 CONTRACTOR
Visitor (escorted) caution amber VISITOR · ESCORT REQUIRED
Visitor (unescorted) neutral green VISITOR
Program-cleared hostile red accent + electric-500 base FDT · CLEARED

Front layout

  • Top stripe with tier label (Micro, uppercase, white text)
  • Photo, 35×45mm, left-aligned
  • Name (H3, fog-100) + role (Body, steel-300) beside photo
  • FDT hex mark + wordmark, bottom-left
  • Employee ID (mono, Data) bottom-right

Back

  • Emergency contact strip (small caps)
  • QR code for verification endpoint, 20×20mm
  • Policy text (Micro, steel-400, justified): lost-badge procedure, return-to-sender, etc.
  • Card serial (mono, Data) bottom-center

Material: matte PVC, 0.76mm thickness. No laminated glossy finish. No embossing. Lanyards are flat-weave polyester, navy with a thin electric-blue stripe, breakaway clasp.

Apparel

T-shirts

Heavyweight cotton (6oz+) or cotton-poly blend. Fits: unisex (primary), fitted (secondary). Colors in strict order of preference:

  1. Navy (#0A1220 equivalent) - primary
  2. Black - secondary, for when navy isn’t available in a given blank
  3. Field tan (#C2B280, desaturated) - rare, limited-run only

No heather grays, no white (reads corporate-casual), no color beyond these three. Printing is screen-print for flats, never DTG or sublimation. Embroidery reserved for the wordmark on hats - not shirts.

Placement conventions

  • Left chest - FDT wordmark only, 60mm wide, Barlow Condensed in fog-100. This is the default FDT shirt.
  • Full back - product wordmark (GRIDWATCH, GHOST GRID, QRF) 200mm wide, Barlow Condensed, single-color. Optional line below in mono: mission codename, coordinates, or date range (one-off limited runs - e.g., a specific operational test cycle).
  • Sleeve - small mission patch, 40mm round, one sleeve only (left).
  • Never - centered chest (reads like a band tee), full front + full back (reads like a tourist shirt), all three zones (reads like a NASCAR pit crew).

The three existing t-shirt mockups that tested correctly follow the left-chest + optional full-back convention. Preserve that shape.

Hats

6-panel structured, curved bill (not flat - flat brims read as lifestyle/streetwear, which is a different brand). Colors: navy or black, never camo, never tan in cap form. Closure: buckle or metal slide, not snapback or stretch-fit. Velcro back acceptable for tactical-patch compatibility.

Hat front

FDT wordmark in Barlow Condensed 700, ~40mm wide, embroidered in fog-100 on navy or electric-500 on black (dimensional foam embroidery only if the garment manufacturer supports it cleanly - otherwise flat stitch). Hex mark alternate: centered, 25mm tall, same color rules.

Hat back

a velcro panel allowing mission-specific patches. Default: no patch applied at shipment.

No trucker hats (mesh reads lifestyle). No dad hats (too soft for the brand). No beanies with the full wordmark (reserve beanies for subtle hex-mark only, if at all).

Patches

The design language of the digital classification badge extended into physical velcro morale patches. Velcro-backed, 2"×3" rectangular only - no round variants, no novelty shapes. The rectangular geometry matches the classification-badge pattern on the digital side and keeps the family readable on plate carriers, soft-shells, and hook-loop panels. Each FDT product gets a “mission badge”:

  • GRIDWATCH - hex-grid pattern + wordmark, electric blue on navy
  • GHOST GRID - concentric radar rings + wordmark, electric blue on black
  • QRF - compass rose + wordmark, fog-100 on navy
  • OVERWATCH - lens/reticle glyph + wordmark, caution amber on navy
  • SECTOR - pixel cross (nod to the handheld origin) + wordmark

Patches are embroidered, not printed. Flat stitch, merrowed edge, no dome / no foil / no glow-in-the-dark thread. The same restraint the digital system observes applies here - the mark does the work, the edge is clean, there’s no distressing or “tactical wear” added.

Stickers

Die-cut single-color vinyl stickers. Three standard sizes:

  • Laptop small - 50mm max dimension. Fits alongside other stickers without dominating.
  • Laptop large - 90mm max dimension. Solo placement.
  • Helmet / gear - 75mm, high-tack adhesive, weatherproof. Reserved for ruggedized device labeling (iPad cases, peripheral gear), not consumer distribution.

Design options, in preference order:

  1. Hex mark alone - electric blue, white, or fog-100. The default identity sticker.
  2. Product wordmark - Barlow Condensed, single-color, no container box.
  3. Classification badge - extends the digital PROGRAM SENSITIVE and FDT CONTROLLED pills into physical form. Full sticker follows the 15%-fill / 100%-stroke pattern adapted for vinyl (solid color fill, die-cut to the rounded-pill shape).
  4. Track ID readout - mono text (UNK-003, TRK-117) die-cut in electric blue. Fan-favorite niche item; quantity-limited runs only.

No transparent backgrounds with multi-color art. No holographic / iridescent stock. No die-cut slogans.

Challenge coins

Defense-industry standard. 1.75" diameter, 3mm thick. Brushed matte finish - brass, gunmetal, or antique silver (never polished bright, never gold-plated, never enamel-filled).

Front

Hex mark centered, FDT wordmark arced above, year of issue arced below in mono (Data style). Edges: milled reeded.

Back

Product- or event-specific. Can carry a product wordmark, a mission codename, an operational theater reference, a launch date. Keep it text-first. No portraits, no eagles, no flags, no Latin.

Issued: employee anniversaries (1, 5, 10 years), product launches (limited run numbered to match LRIP quantity), strategic customer partnerships.

Drinkware & desk items

Mugs

Matte black ceramic, 12oz standard. Single-color print in fog-100: FDT wordmark on one side, optional hex mark on the opposite side. No “world’s best X” humor items, no novelty shapes.

Notebooks

Dot-grid or graph interior (never lined - it’s a defense-tech company, it uses grids). Navy softcover with blind deboss of the hex mark, bottom-right. 100 pages, 90gsm paper minimum. No branded pens included - pens are their own thing.

Pens

Matte black aluminum body (not plastic). Electric-blue clip. Gel ink, not ballpoint. Wordmark laser-etched on the barrel, small, single line. No pen caps with the full wordmark stamped - too much.

Event collateral

For AUSA, DEFCON, industry conferences, and customer events: limited-run physical goods are acceptable and actually good for the brand. Rules:

  • One-off event variants may include the event name in Barlow Condensed - e.g., “AUSA 2026” - rendered in the caution-amber used on the digital event banner, maintaining the link.
  • Conference totes: navy canvas, wordmark one side, nothing else. Never map-of-the-world art, never stylized drone silhouettes, never “warfighter” imagery.
  • Lanyards at events carry the same striped navy + electric-blue pattern as employee badge lanyards, with the event name woven into the strap.
  • Giveaway items (stickers, patches, pins) are numbered and dated on the back where possible - limited-run scarcity is part of the defense-tech-merch character.

Anti-patterns - physical

Reject on sight:

  • Camouflage prints - any pattern, any color. MultiCam, woodland, digital, solid OD green in a tactical context. FDT is a technology company, not a unit.
  • Skull / crossbones / grim-reaper / punisher iconography - the mall-ninja operator aesthetic is the single worst thing physical defense-industry merch does. None of it. Ever.
  • “Infidel,” “Sheep/Wolf/Sheepdog,” “Molon Labe,” Latin war mottos - hard no, regardless of intent. Not in embroidery, print, coin reverse, or sticker form.
  • Flags - including American flags, subdued / IR-reflective / “thin blue line” variants. FDT doesn’t put flags on its merchandise. If a customer needs a flag, they have one.
  • Chrome, polished metal, gold plating - matte only, across every metal surface. No shine.
  • Distressed / vintage / “used” effects - no faded prints, no intentionally-worn edges, no “this patch looks like it’s been through combat” artifice.
  • Foil, holographic, glow-in-the-dark, metallic thread - none of it.
  • Novelty shapes - no mugs shaped like magazines, no stress balls shaped like drones, no bottle openers shaped like carbines. The shapes are the shapes.
  • Bright-color background garments - the apparel palette is navy, black, and occasionally field tan. Red, orange, yellow shirts don’t exist in this system.
  • Full-scene printed t-shirts - a GRIDWATCH shirt is a wordmark, not an illustrated battle scene. If you can’t do it with one color and a mark, you can’t do it.