Opportunities For Change & Innovation

This week I created some rules for my logo. My logo is interesting because it’s rather playful in nature and there’s a lot that can be done with it. I have three possible marks that can be used to represent place and four base colours to play with as well. 

This base set of rules is a good way to get me going on my brand guide. There’s a lot more to implement though, and I’m excited to keep going.

Day Seven - Blog Post #8

Today we had our prototypes ready for other students to look at and discover. I got some really cool information and feedback about my package just by watching my students pick my package up and open it. The reaction I received from the students who looked at my package was exactly what I’d hoped for. It helped though that the class that came in was made up of international students, many of those being from Japan.  I had two Japanese students and a student from China who had been to Japan many times look at my package.

They were delighted with it and told me that the package was really similar to what you would actually see on the shelf in Japan to hold a good knife. They told me that the packaging style felt expensive and luxurious. I also got many good tips on how to make it even more authentic, such as possibly carving a pattern, making sure to give it a smooth finish and adding the Sun from the Japanese flag to directly behind the brand name on the paper slip.

Watching students interact and open my package made me really excited to work on my package further. It was great to see people’s reaction as they opened the box. No one had trouble opening it and they also told me that they liked how simple it was. They also told me that they would definitely keep the box and use it to hold other items or even just display it in their home.

I have a lot of work ahead of me, but I am excited to keep going.

The biggest challenge I have when looking at portfolio websites is that oftentimes, the user experience is poor because of the amount of focus the designer has put into the user interface. I can appreciate a flashy website with a lot of moving pieces but I don’t think that there’s a place for them on a portfolio website unless it’s serving a purpose. For example, it might make sense for someone whose career is in uiux to show off what they can do, but something that’s been drilled into me as a design student is the concept of function over form.

When looking for a portfolio website that inspired me, I found that I leaned towards websites that used grids, that had a definite branded look (colour, style, etc) and that was easy to navigate.

Kate Moross is a bit of a hero of mine. (Kate goes by they/them) They’re a fantastic designer that has been in the business for over a decade and is based out of London. Their work is vibrant, stylized and unique. 

Their website neatly links to each piece and gives many examples of it in different lighting and with great photography. They lay out their involvement in the project in most cases and Kate’s site seems to update each year.

I really like the way Kate’s site is laid out because while they utilize a grid, it has a couple of quirks to it which stays true to their nature as a designer. Kate isn’t afraid to be themself on their own website and I think that’s important, as it was discussed in class, it’s vital to represent yourself truthfully.

I also really like how easy it is to navigate Kate’s website.

The sidebar is bright and easy to find and it pretty much takes you anywhere you might think to go. Kate also has an extensive background though with a lot more experience than I’ve had. They’re well known worldwide and even if you think you’ve never seen their stuff, you most likely have. While my portfolio will be smaller to start, I think a simple layout like this would be easier to keep building up.

Summary of takeaways for my own portfolio site:

Keep it simple, only use flashy stuff if it’s necessary. As a designer, I tend to lean towards a minimalistic approach so my website should reflect that.

Be honest. Don’t use language that you don’t mean when referring to yourself. 

Give users the information that they’re seeking with minimal effort. 

Try to use excellent photography and avoid unedited/poor quality imagery for the website. Reshoot if you have the time or use mockups for now. 

Explain what you did for each project so that people can understand what they’re looking at and why.

We’ve Got Colour

So with a chosen logo to work with, I now have to figure out colour. I know these posts have been a little bit long-winded but bear with me here, typing all this out is helping me think as well. 

When working with colour, it’s important to think about emotions you’re trying to get across as well as what your audience is. Since my audience is the community, I want to use colours that are welcoming and friendly.

I started by collecting some colours that I like. I usually do this by looking at other work I’ve done and picking from photos that fit the mood of the project.

Lately, I’ve been really into softer, bright colours. 

These are some of the colour combos that I played with for this project but ultimately, I’ve ended up on the pale yellow, red and blue. They’re a softer take on a fully saturated primary palette. I may use the light pink as well later in some pattern work. 

Yellow = optimism, happiness, enthusiasm, hope red = passion, love, fire, determination blue = sea, sky, confidence, calm

We were asked to think about where we’d be in 5-10 years and what we’d like to be doing. This is a good tool for portfolio work because it can help guide what you want others to get out of it.

My Vision:

I want to be changing the world in a positive way through design.

Steps:

Work full time at Common Foundry and develop my design skills.

Create work for clients and passion projects for myself that is effective.

Involve myself in the community and take initiative.

Create every single day and travel often, meet new people, learn, grow, adapt and problem solve as best I can. 

The Rise of Design Thinking in Meetings and Events

I really enjoyed the relevancy of this reading for this class and felt that although it uses some industry-specific language it is still accessible. It seems like such a simple concept to ‘design from the attendees’ perspective’ but it also et like a ‘eureka moment’ to read that phrase. I think that in the past, many events have been designed specifically with the organizers perspective and it feels like designing for attendees is just common sense. What better way to use a people-oriented method like design-thinking?

Opportunity, Formulate, Build and Debrief

It’s easy to fall deeply into the design aspect of our grad show because that is the primary focus, displaying our work, but I think this reading has an excellent point about involving the attendees to keep their focus. There’s the yearning to want to make a whole new experience and refresh the Design grad show but there’s also the need to work with the space (and items in that space) that we have. We want the attendees to feel welcome but not overwhelmed, and we want to make sure that everyone involved is getting the same amount of attention to detail and care as everyone else because all attendee’s motivations for being there are different and in the case of our event, they’re most likely there to support one or two students in particular. 

“Consciously think about event design from the user perspective.” I think that our focus for the grad show, now that we’ve obtained a speaker and location, is to really focus on wayfinding and hammer out how we want to display our work in a way that does the work justice. We need to map out the floorplan in a way that prioritizes the attendee’s experience and can maybe be interactive.

I’m wondering what might be a good way to make our show a bit interactive? We were thinking about creating a walk through an area of our work that would require the attendee moving through all of it, sort of like a museum floor, but even better could be printed objects they can pick up and touch or digital screens that they can swipe through.

I think we have many opportunities here and after this reading, I’m feeling inspired.

Client Survey

General Company Info 

What is the name of your company?  Place

What is your business/what do you do?  Place provides a single location for a range of events in Nanaimo’s downtown core. It can be a pop-up market, a venue for a reception, an intimate concert, a wedding, a dance, an art class, the possibilities are endless.

How old is your company?  The company has yet to exist.

What is the size of your company? A small core of people involved in bettering downtown Nanaimo. two people leading a small team of 5-6.

Are there specific dates the project needs to be completed?  No.

Your budget dictates how much time can be spent on your project. What is the budget?  Open

Describe your business in one sentence.  No matter what event you are hosting, this is the place for it.

Describe your business in two words? Convenient, Reliable

Describe your business in one word? Perfect

What doesn’t your business do, or do well? Does not host large concerts, or sporting events.

What differentiates your business from competitors? Ease of access, Place’s main interest isn’t how much money can be made but in creating a place for the community to use without burning a hole in people’s wallets.

Is there a story that is unique to your company? When searching for a location for a grad show, Sara realized that there really wasn't’ anywhere in the downtown core that was appropriately sized or available for a small reception.

Or perhaps a unique story to the company name?  Every city should have a place, somewhere that you can go that would be good for a range of events, but also a safe please for youth to hang out and host community events.

What are your business objectives?  To create a beautiful place to host events that can host a range of things from shows, events, receptions, to tourist attractions in the summer months like a large market or informational sessions.

What do you want the design/redesign to do for your company?  I want it to give the company a modern look and feel that is also welcoming to the community.

General Image of Company 

If you company/brand was a person who would it be? Why? I don’t know if it would be a person so much as a representation or even an animal. Place should be able to represent Nanaimo and the future of Nanaimo and its community. If anything, I’d say that I’d want it to be represented by the Orca because of its sense of community and ties to the Salish sea.

Is there an important object, building or person for your business? The building for this business is what makes the business and it would be located right downtown, on the water.

How do you want the public to perceive your image?  A meeting hall, a place that represents Nanaimo, a sense of place for Nanaimo. It should feel like home but also fresh.

What do you want to be famous for?  Being the place that people go to when they need a place.

What words should the general public associate your business with? Name at least 3. Modern, Inviting, Perfect

How do you want your image to be seen in 2 years? 10 years?  Comfortable, familiar, renowned

Competitors 

Who are your competitors?  Vancouver Island Conference Center, Port Theatre

How are they better/worse than your product/service?  Vancouver Island Conference Center has a larger space to host larger events, Port theatre has better space for theatrical events.

Who might you compete with in the future? More developments. 

The Target Audience 

Who is your customer? Describe in detail. My customer is anyone who is looking to use a space but is having trouble finding a good venue for it. A lot of people in Nanaimo have to settle for a venue that isn’t necessarily ideal and we are lacking a community spot. 

What do they do?  Live in Nanaimo and actively work towards bettering the downtown community via productions or events.

What do they watch? Community productions, local musicians, short plays, open mics.

Who is the ideal customer? Someone who perhaps wants to bring more culture to the city but lacks the funding/space.

How old is your ideal customer? 20-60

How do they find out about you? Through advertisements downtown, facebook, Nanaimo’s website

What do they want from you?  A place to host an event.

What customers do you not want to attract?  People who want to host an extremely large event or have the money to do so elsewhere. (Large corporate events that exceed capacity)  

What do you offer your customers that your competition does not? A place that can be molded easily to fit their needs. The place isn’t designed a certain way to format one specific thing so it means its a space that can be used for a variety of things without many spacial issues.

Current identity 

Do you have an identity?  No

What are two identities or logos that you like? Dislike? I like the CBC logo and the CNR logo. I don’t like the Nanaimo Chamber logo   

What colours do you like? Dislike?  I like sunset colours and when you just use multiple shades. I don’t like intense greens or dull colours.

Anything else? 

What did we not ask that you want us to understand? The Place isn’t like anything that’s already in Nanaimo because it isn’t held back by a small size or a regular business, it isn’t meant to make money from events, just enough to cover expenses. It’s meant to be somewhere rentable that people can use to host a variety of events and promote community within Nanaimo.

Day One - Blog Post #1

I knew that class would be good today when we walked in and there was a picture of an egg on the powerpoint. I thought we were probably going to talk abt how an egg is a naturally good package, I didn’t think that we were going to have the opportunity to try and design a safe package for an egg in 20 minutes!

We weren’t given a lot of direction other than to make the package, so my group wondered if we were supposed to focus on appearance, function or perhaps both. We decided to go for both and used two rolls of duck tape to encase the egg, paper to cushion it and then we wrapped it in foam. We also gave our package a little bit of decoration in the form of a pipecleaner bow and an origami butterfly. 

I think we focused too much on the appearance of the package instead of putting as much focus on the function. Our package was poorly taped and when Nancy shoved it off the table, unfortunately, the package burst a bit and the eggshell got a crack in it.

It was really fun to do something so fast and right away and got our brains thinking for the rest of the day!

We learned how to score paper using a bone tool and tried it out ourselves on a box shape. So far, I’m really enjoying how hands on this class is.

Our assignment for this next week is to take a package that we were given in class and reproduce it three times, let’s see how it turns out!

Something to reflect on: We’re always wanting to think of the environment as graphic designers but when it comes to packaging and brand, brand needs to come first for a corporation. I think that makes it the graphic designer’s job, to provide a sustainable design for the company in question from the get-go. When redesigning for a brand, however, and working for someone like coca-cola who uses tons and tons of plastic each year but is so iconic, how much room does a designer have to play and is it that designer’s duty to do what they can to help the environment even if it means deviating from brand standards? Is it possible to stick to brand standards with the environment in mind?

Erin Gibbs Response

This past week, we had Erin Gibbs join our class and present her process to us. She was extremely knowledgable and very thorough about her process. As someone who creates items for a customer base already, I found it really cool and helpful to learn about how she creates and how her items get manufactured. It was our task to come up with a piece in response to her work or inspired by it. I remember immediately scratching out this phrase after the class, perhaps the fact that she showed us a jungle-inspired line was to blame. Either way, I had a lot of fun making this piece though it alone took me 5+ hours. I can’t imagine creating a whole line based on it!