New Identity New Website
After months of hard work and two years in making, we are ready to unveil the new roof identity (with updated subbrands) and the new website to call it our digital home. But how this all has transpired? It was a long and challenging road but the results make it all worth it, and we wanted to share that excitement with the world.
How did everything begin? With a question and a need. The question was “What makes design education at Winona State University unique?” and the need was to provide resources for our current students while being inviting to our future students. As with everything in design the project was approached from different directions, by different faculty, and different groups of students across three classes—ART 360 New Media & Technology Design, ART 375 Advanced Design Project, and ART 460 Portfolio & Professional Development. Through a collaborative effort of students with diverse backgrounds and experiences content topics were identified, questions were raised, options were considered, and user experience was slowly taking shape through the interface and layout structure.
The question—”What makes design education at Winona State University?”—was easy to answer due to the quality of the curriculum, the innovative I–Design major, and equipment/technology potential. However, we were facing two problems—one, I–Design although innovative and fresh wasn’t as recognizable as Graphic Design major; and two, student work and benefits/services were not visible enough. Since our focus over the past four years was to promote I–Design we decided to take a step back and promote the Design Program as a whole, continue pushing I–Design major, and give Graphic Design major attention it deserves. This is how the visual system for Design Program and its components—I–Design and Graphic Design—came to be. Through this system consistency and recognizability will be achieved and a solid foundation for future growth is made.
The need—”To provide resources for our current students while being inviting to our future students”—required a strategic and detailed approach. Relying on limited information at different websites and physical locations, or the word of mouth simply was not efficient for the society we live in now. Information needs to be transparent, accurate, and easily accessible. With those three principles, we approached curating content to support our current students and to provide a platform for the curious eyes and minds of our future students. There was a need to address the Design Program Application process, scholarship opportunities, professional resources, internship requirements and process, and international exposure options. At the same time, we wanted to bring our two majors closer to our prospective students; no matter the background or familiarity with design education.
As structure and direction were solidifying over a period of two years the overall approach was streamlined resulting in a live project associated with Fall 2019’s ART 365 Campaign & Systems Design providing a platform for student teams to compete. Four teams approached the project under Associate Professor of Design Chun Lok Mah as supervising faculty and Assistant Professor of Design Danilo Bojic as the client. The teams and their members were:
- Diversifi (Hannah Anderson ’21, Nathan Birch ’21, Bryanna Peterson ’21, Elizabeth Pierce ’21)
- Lunar Crest Media (Emily Becker ’21, RaeAnna Hahn ’22, Erika Olson ’21)
- Paw & Ink (Katelyn Biernat ’21, Camden Ellingson ’21, Ellen Klismith ’21)
- Wretched (Hannah Harlow ’21, Nicholas Kopp ’21, Michelle Truxal ’21).
The four teams came up with full visual solutions for branding of the Program and fleshed out working prototypes of fully developed websites. After careful consideration, in-depth evaluation, and review one visual direction was chosen for branding and an overall direction for the website with minor integration of structural elements from other proposals was pursued. The winning team to push the new identity and website was Wretched composed by Hannah Harlow ’21, Nichola Kopp ’21, and Michelle Truxal ’21. The new visual identity and the visual assets for Graphic Design were developed by Michelle Truxal, while illustrations for the whole website were created by Hannah Harlow, and visual identity and assets for Design Program and I–Design were developed, and the website was polished and pushed to live by Nicholas Kopp.
A big thank you to all the students who competed and contributed to developing the new visual system and website: Hannah Anderson, Emily Becker, Katelyn Biernat, Nathan Birch, Camden Ellingson, RaeAnna Hahn, Hannah Harlow, Ellen Klismith, Nicholas Kopp, Erika Olson, Bryanna Peterson, Elizabeth Pierce, and Michelle Truxal. Additional thank you to Abbey Kline ’22 and Morgan Sumter ’22 for countless hours of documenting the facility and students, and to Nicholas Kopp for codirecting and leading the photoshoot alongside Assistant Professor of Design Danilo Bojic. The photography on the website would not be without these talented students. We are all grateful for the mass response and participation by the students in the Design Program; thank you for representing the community spirit we all value so much. And a special thank you to Nicholas Kopp for investing countless hours making a million adjustments and changes, and for his continual dedication to singlehandedly push the website through live even outside class time and regular semester.
Welcome to our new digital home. This website is made by the students for the students! Join the conversation on our social media channels.
Extended appreciation to all Design students participating in the photoshoot for the new website: Jack Baumert ’22, Katelyn Biernat ’21, Nathan Birch ’21, Loic-Andre Boyogueno ’23, Rebecca Braun ’23, Emma Brezina ’22, Alicia Farrell ’22, Hannah Harlow ’21, Sarah Harter ’22, May Hayes ’22, Xin He ’22, Hunter Taelor ’23, Gabriella Klema ’23, Abbey Kline ’22, Nicholas Kopp ’21, Megan McCormick ’23, Makenna Meyers ’22, Erika Olson ’21, Bryanna Peterson ’21, Elizabeth Pierce ’21, Kennedy Pierre-Toussaint ’22, SiAnna Sousa ’23, Mitchell Steinhoff ’23, Esther Stoy ’23, Morgan Sumter ’22, Abby Trask ’22, Annie Treichel ’22, Lydia Velishek ’23, Yitong Wang ’23, and Jordan Wuensch ’22.
