Creating Visual Designs for the Emilio Nares Foundation
This project is driven by a refined design approach that balances clarity and intention with contemporary visuals and overall cohesive brand harmony.
Client:
Emilio Nares Foundation
Category:
Visual Design, Brand Image
My Role:
Visual Designer · Team of 3
Our client, the Emilio Nares Foundation, needed help with creating visual graphics and fliers to promote their annual high-stakes event, Harvest for Hope. 🌻
The Emilio Nares Foundation begins with a boy named Emilio, who was diagnosed with Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia (ALL). His parents felt their world turn upside down, suddenly facing hospital visits, intensive chemotherapy, and a transplant. While living in the hospital, it became evident to Emilio's parents that other patients were not as fortunate to have the same support they did from friends, family, and strangers.
As Emilio passed shortly before his sixth birthday, his parents created the Emilio Nares Foundation to honor his memory and help low-income undeserved families meet basic needs, especially transportation. ENF provides a family resource center including access to shelter and food, no-cost transportation, free hospital-provided snack bags, and one-on-one and group activity sessions.
Tania, our stakeholder representative, expressed wanting a brand redesign and fresh, modern image to the Emilio Nares Foundation. During our first meeting, she showed us examples from their current Instagram content, as well as the operating website at the time.
Our Research
My two fellow visual designers and I got to brainstorming. Tania put emphasis on subtle sunflower imagery due to their foundation's brand. She also desired warm, fall palettes and modern, classy typography to elevate their image.
We started with making a brand kit, iterated to its final version after multiple personal meetings with Tania and adhering to her feedback.
The Design Process
Research & Planning
We first met our stakeholder representative, Tania, in January at the start of the TBD program. There, we discussed ENF's wants and needs regarding their social media and graphic designs. We learned about their mission, vision for their online presence, and their big event, Harvest for Hope.
Design & Iteration
Our visual design team used Canva to create multiple drafted designs to present to Tania. Heeding her wishes to steer away from their past visual themes, we created our own prominent color palette to use for ENF's new visual image.
Fixing on Feedback
With each presented slideshow at our stakeholder meetings, we'd present Tania with a minimum of 3 different designs based on color schemes, visual hierarchy, and typography. She would tell us what she liked best and what elements she wanted changed. Our team worked quickly and efficiently to adhere to her critiques ASAP by ENF's deadlines.
The Good, The Bad, and Ugly
The Solution
The Results
50+ design iterations.
15 biweekly stakeholder meetings.
1 satisfied client.
Reflection
What I learned from this project:
I'm grateful for our work with Tania and learning to do visual designs for a stakeholder depending on our production for their hard deadlines. Having biweekly stakeholder meetings when I was juggling 4 classes and a part-time job was notably difficult at times, as I recall hopping in Zoom meetings at the very mall I would have to clock in at 10 minutes later. My team was equally as busy, juggling other extracurriculars or classes/finals. We gave each other grace for our circumstances and despite cutting it close at times, still arrived to meetings with our minimum required deliverables.
What I'd change moving forward:
I knew that our work with the Emilio Nares Foundation was voluntary/on a timeline. I'm happy with what we've produced for them and hope it's made things easier for their organization. Moving forward, I'd be open to exploring visual design further using more advanced tools like Adobe Photoshop shall I have the time/resources. Though, for their needs, Canva was sufficient.
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