West Seattle
Food Bank
visual design
a brand re-design for a local non-profit with a goal of revamping their current visual systems and visually portraying their community goals.
overview
team
Monica Ionescu
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I was tasked with revamping and rebranding the current visual system of a local non-profit. My goal, through research, was to create a system that helped capture the goals and vision of the organization. During this time, I redesigned the logo + iconography, created a new color scheme, established a brand typeface use, and applied these principles towards everyday interactions and objects.
made for
Fun :)
Non-profit group
my role
Visual Designer
when
5 weeks
Spring 2020
How can I redesign the West Seattle Food Bank's brand to showcase its goals and vision as an organization?
research
Organization's Goals
Current Visual System
By going through the website, I found that the organization wanted to focus on community, health, and safety by increasing access to resources.
The current state of the visual brand was a bit overwhelming. There is a lot of bright colors, yet they are on target for color scheme as the choices do align with food, health, (green) and passion (red). The main page also bombards the user with information and photos, crowding the page. However, they did have some strong hierarchy at the top and clear icons (though they are unrelated to the task).
Screen grab of the current WSFB homepage.
Current WSFB logo.
Current WSFB color palette.
new visual system
Typeface
For the headings, I chose a chunkier, smooth font that has a retro feel in order to exemplify how long WSFB has been helping the community. For the bulk of the text, I chose a narrow, modern font that had rounded ends. This would maintain the soft, caring feel of the brand while hinting at its current involvement in community and progress as an organization.
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header
Squada
One
ABCDEFGHIJKLM
NOPQRSTUVWXYZ
abcdefghijklm
nopqrstuvwxyz
0123456789+!@*()”:?
sub-header
Quicksand Bold
ABCDEFGHIJKLM
NOPQRSTUVWXYZ
abcdefghijklm
nopqrstuvwxyz
0123456789+!@*()”:?
body
Quicksand Medium
ABCDEFGHIJKLM
NOPQRSTUVWXYZ
abcdefghijklm
nopqrstuvwxyz
0123456789+!@*()”:?
captions
Quicksand Light
ABCDEFGHIJKLM
NOPQRSTUVWXYZ
abcdefghijklm
nopqrstuvwxyz
0123456789+!@*()”:?
Color Palette
I chose red and green as my main colors in order to maintain a connection to the original design and because I thought they related well to the mission. Green embodies food and health and red evokes passion. I decided to choose both a dark and light version of the green/red. The light green would be used the most as a highlighting color. The dark red is meant to be used for titles and important information. The other two should be used scarcely as accents.
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dark green
hex: 476338
rgb: 71, 99, 56
dark red/orange
hex: bc4227
rgb: 188, 66, 39
light green
hex: cacea9
rgb: 202, 206, 169
burnt orange
hex: d06029
rgb: 208, 106, 41
iconography
Logo
Because of the focus on the community, donations, and health, I decided to design my logo based on those principles. The hands are extending towards, in an act of care and donation. The orange carrot stands out and emphasizes the food and health aspect. The lines are all softened and thick, yet the logo is a bit playful and drawn as a way to further soften the feel. ​
west
seattle
Iconography
Because of the focus on the community, donations, and health, I decided to design my logo based on those principles. The hands are extending towards, in an act of care and donation. The orange carrot stands out and emphasizes the food and health aspect. The lines are all softened and thick, yet the logo is a bit playful and drawn as a way to further soften the feel. ​
"take action"
"donate funds"
"get food"
in practice
Mobile Flow
During my research, I found myself being overwhelmed when on the site. I also learned that there was a large increase in the at-home delivery service due to COVID-19. Together, this led me to focus my mobile flow on simplifying the home page and easing the user's access to information on their services.
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The redesign included a carousel that housed all of the main actions taken on the site. The number of images was also decreased significantly. Information was neatly organized and could be found through clear buttons and hierarchy.
Merchandise
Here are some examples of how the design should transfer across products.
reflection
While I feel like my skills as a designer increased over the course of this project, there are many things I would redo. Mostly, I would have looked into more theory about color and font choices, as I didn't really understand how strongly these could relay a message.
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I would have also liked to spend more time looking at mobile applications and understanding interactive design. Overall, I feel as though my design is a little too childish (playful, drawn, colorful) for the organization, but this also hopefully adds to the overall charm.
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