Cesco Leonardo
2026
Who am I?
I take photographs, I design, and I spend an awful lot of hours in front of a screen dragging sliders.
I finished school in Milan in 2022, then took a course in filmmaking and photography. In 2024 I registered as a freelancer and found out what the word really means.
The work in Milan closed things off instead of opening up. I wanted to understand where what I do on instinct comes from, and I missed working alongside someone.
So, here I am.
The rebranding
2025/2026
I come into contact with the Vapeman e-cigarette shop in 2022, taking some product photographs. Three years later the owner asks me to redesign its identity and wants a hexagonal logo, one that recalls the carbon molecule. From the first briefs the steampunk imagery seems the right one. For a year I put it to the test in the only Vapeman shop of the time, on the outskirts of Milan.
At the beginning of 2026 work starts on the second shop, the first in Milan, a big city, a different market from the outskirts, and the brand has to speak another language.
I propose a system that places it outside the street imagery of vaping: from a nerdy style, dark and full of LEDs, to a bright brand where cleanliness and kindness take the place of swagger.
The logo is the only element that survives the rebranding.
In Milan the identity goes down well. In May 2026, for lack of budget, the collaboration with the client comes to an end.
Logo, colors and graphic system are still in use today.
Archivo
Progettato per la leggibilità ad alta velocità, funziona a qualsiasi dimensione. Voce principale del brand, dalla caption Instagram al cartello in vetrina.
IBM Plex Mono
Erede tipografico delle macchine da scrivere IBM. Da utilizzare solo per dati, lotti e prezzi. Numeri sempre monospaziati.
The identity
2025/2026
I meet PLY’s four founders in February 2025. The startup works with professionals and clients. Knowing the budget is next to nothing, I get straight to work on the brand identity. The name PLY is Isabella Orlando’s idea.
Most of the work done for PLY is covered by an NDA.
I start from the logo, looking for animals that stand for "putting aside" and "working toward growth". After a week spent abstracting a squirrel, I realize it might not be the right idea for an app that wants to speak to people directly. I look for something else.
I start playing with the “PLY” lettering and find that, in lowercase, it looks like a stylized face.
The logo proposal splits the room: three people see a face, three see the word. The pairing works, we keep it.
A study on color confirms the wish to move away from the usual blue- green of corporate tech, toward a warmer palette. I decide the graphic style; the UI is handed to another professional. For the illustrations I get help from Illustrator’s AI and refine every character.
The app has yet to launch. Logo, colors and graphic decisions were accepted and implemented in the prototype.
Loew Variable
Typeface tech pulita, occupa bene gli spazi di lavoro e risulta più friendly rispetto alle sue simili.
Unico font del brand.
The editorial
2025/2026
In 2022 I start doing parkour in Milan and get close to the community.
My camera never sits still: I try to document not only the movement, but what is behind it: the laughter, the tears, the mental blocks, the twisted ankles and the small personal victories.
Pasta Moves, an Italian collective of nine, runs the Pasta Jams, whose photo competitions I win two years running.
Between 2024 and 2026 Pasta shoots the clips for the “Al Dente” project.
In September 2025 they ask me to follow them as a photographer across Orvieto, Rome and Pesaro; in February 2026 we close in Catania.
I join the team in April 2026 and propose an editorial project to support the film, to be sold at the Pasta Jam in May 2026 in Catania.
I split the magazine into seven chapters: the project, the cities, the interviews with the athletes, the backstage, the voices of the community, the portfolio and the credits.
In two weeks I close the magazine. At the Catania première: 33 copies, 20 in Italian and 13 in English, all sold. The feedback says A5 does the photographs no favors.
At Holding Hands in Prague we sell an A4 reprint: 13 copies, all sold.
Pasta Magazine is the first editorial project conceived, laid out and printed entirely by me.
Texts by me and Lorenzo d’Albertas. The photographs are mine for the second and third tour, Ivaylo Erev’s for the first, with contributions from Hector Gost Godoy, Silvia Carnemolla and Isaac Carlo.
The typefaces are Bauer Bodoni Std and Roboto Mono.
Under every shot: the spot, the city, the date and the Instagram handle, like an archive.
The photobook
2022/202x
November 2022. Riccardo Landi, a friend, director and trusted collaborator, calls me: “I am thinking about a documentary in South Africa, on the attitude of the people there toward animal and environmental conservation. Would you be in?” “Yes.”
In October 2023 we go down to Limpopo. A year of preparation, a month of shooting, almost three years of post-production. No sponsor: Riccardo, Narcis and I self-produce everything.
The documentary is nearly done, the photobook still in production. It is a mammoth thing to digest.
I run into problems of ethics, of language and of form. They are considerations that teach me that finishing a project takes more than technique: it takes a searching look inward.
Crossroad is the project I care about most: after three years it reminds me that the journey is not over, it is only beginning.
The photobook is square, 280×280 mm. The captions tell the date, the time, the place and what was happening; sometimes I leave parts out to protect the privacy of people and places. About 190 pages, hardcover.
The texts are separate, in a small booklet alongside. Reading order: photobook, then booklet, then both. The images are meant to be taken in with the gut first; the booklet closes the circle.
The images that follow are a small selection of the publishable part not covered by an NDA.
The product
07-08/2026
The real work of a freelancer is not taking photographs or shooting video, it is networking.
I am often asked: “Do you have anything of your own to show me?” And the answer is always to pull out the phone, open Instagram or a PDF.
A small screen, an unreliable connection, and a gesture everyone makes: on a phone, what we see seems not worth remembering.
At first I design a deck of 10×10 cards, eyeletted at the top left.
Prototyping I find the limits: the paper is not strong enough, the eyelets are too thick and it handles badly unless it is resting on a table.
Faults that go against the spirit of the project: to make something you can handle anywhere, standing, sitting or upside down.
So “Portafolio” is born, a case designed and 3D printed to always carry some work with me in physical form. It clips onto a backpack.
Four sections: Graphic Design, Photography, Product Design and business cards.
Inside, concertina cards that tell the projects. On the front, a QR code to my site. On the sides my logo, and the backpack clips have a grey card and a white card set into them for white balance.
I start 3D printing in July 2026, choosing this production technique for how easy it is to iterate.
In the future I do not rule out a Portafolio in a finer material, like wood.
Portafolio was designed and printed in August 2026.
