Design Corps 2: GoFB — Riya Parekh

Design Corps: Guardians of Flushing Bay (GoFB)

Branding
Web Design
Research
Collaboration

Designers: Riya Parekh
Design Corps (DC) Creative Director: Michael L Kelly

This project was an individual project I was tasked to explore and address the needs of our client; Guardians of Flushing Bay (GoFB). They are a coalition of human-powered boaters, park users, and local residents advocating for a healthy and equitably accessible Flushing Waterways, in Queens, NY. They accomplish their goals through family-friendly waterfront programming, community science and stewardship, and grassroots organizing.

While working with this client I employed empathic design practices to produce branding and marketing materials - visual identity, print materials, social media campaign and merchandise. I executed a 3-part model, wherein each part builds on or is in dialogue with the others:

Phase I: Preliminary Research:
Initially, I researched and analyzed the client’s position and communication needs. My approach included participating in brainstorming sessions with some of my colleagues and my Creative Director as well as conducting extensive research on who GoFB was and establishing their goals and objectives. Thereafter, I formulated a plan of action and a design strategy, which included making mood boards, ideating upon the campaign language and brand identity. This information was then presented to the Design Corps Creative Director and the client.

Some images from the site research at the Flushing Bay Promenade and Flushing Creek in Queens, NY.

Establishing the audience, campaign language and type direction.

Below is a Deliverable Map, we developed this map as a tool to better help the client understand how each proposed deliverable would reach, interact and communicate with the audience.

Phase II: Design/Content Development:

Depending on the findings of my Preliminary Research, I began developing a design solution. At this stage I worked upon the visual language of the identity, decided upon the type direction, brand colors and finalized a set of deliverables; Poster, Print materials including a designed Info Sheet(One Pager) and Event Flyer Template, Social Media Posts, and Merchandise. These initial content development concepts were then presented to the client, with revisions made and re-presented as necessary.

Brand Colors

#FFD878 #77C611 #03469C #36D3F2 #8ACADD #C9D7D9 #DFF7F7
Kayak Yellow Dragon Boat Coastal Cobalt Beckon Blue Flushing Bay Blue Skipping Stone Waterfront

On the left above is the moodboard which allowed me to communicate the look and feel of the project to our client and based on that I decided upon the final brand colors. Additionally, on right above are some of the brand components, which formed the visual language of the brand identity. These elements were repeated across all deliverables in order to make the designs look and feel more cohesive. The visual elements included:

Using colored chalk outlines that mimic the shape of a wave giving an illustrative feel to the design.
Employing organic shapes which were directly traced from actual images of the bay.
The school of fish moving together as one unit was another repeating motif in the designs. This was done in order to call attention to the marine ecology present in the water and to further represent this idea that we are all working towards one common goal of prioritizing Flushing Waterways.
When using imagery of the creek and bay resorting to using collage as a method to bring forth the idea of grassroots organizing.

Phase III: Design Implementation:
After our design direction was approved by the client, and budgets and schedules were determined we began the creation of the final designs.

AR Poster
A poster that shows the Flushing Creek coming to life when scanned using an Instagram Filter I designer using Meta Spark Studio. By focusing on the ecological communities of the Flushing Waterways, I was attempting to highlight that these waterways could be used as a resource for the audience and therefore more people would be interested in protecting it and taking care of it.

Info Sheet (One Pager) Event Flyer Template

The image on the left is of an Information Sheet (one pager) which would be sent to potential donors that would help explain what GoFB does and outlines their accomplishments. The image on the right is of an Event Flyer for a free, public, outdoor fundraiser. Flushing is a multilingual borough and so I often had to design keeping in mind the main spoken languages; English and Spanish. Therefore, I made sure I used typefaces that were available in both languages.

Social Media Carousel Posts

Merchandise
GoFB have been testing the water in the Flushing Waterways watershed for a sewage-indicating bacteria. The images below show the results of the water quality data. Based on the findings represented in the tables below, I decided to make a water bottle jacket design. Thereby, allowing the water bottle to be a tool to disseminate information and further help spread the cause.