vasuki sunder
designer

Current MFA Design and Technology student at Parsons School of Design, previously B.S. in Cognitive Science & Human Computer Interaction from UCSD

My work explores how we can use design to enhance our human experience.

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Events by Kavya

BACKGROUND 
The primary challenge here was to design a site that satisfied the desires and needs of my client. We worked together to define clear goals for this project so that I could deliver a final product that met all expectations. My client had a fairly clear vision for her desired website and brand redesign — our goal was to define the visual design features, brainstorm brand elements, and create style guides incorporating a variety of font combinations, iconography, and color palettes.


TIMELINE8 weeks

AREABranding
Web Design
 Social Media

Project Goals


OBJECTIVE #1Create a brand identity that conjures feelings of elegance and simplicity.
OBJECTIVE #2
Ensure that it stands out from other event planning websites as a more elevated option.
OBJECTIVE #3
All branding has a consistent and identifiable color palette that incorporates elements of existing logo.




1. Understanding the problem


1.1 Issues with existing product

I began with analyzing EBK's current website, which was created on one of Squarespace's template options. After annotating my observations, I translated them into insights that would help inform the final design.




Key Insights
INSIGHT #1Website doesn't follow accessibility guidelines.

Low contrast text, font size and font color, and image overlays contribute to an overall poor readability.

INSIGHT #2
No coherent color scheme.

All headings and text seem to be using default values of black and white, without any color palette. The fonts and colors don't contribute to the overall recognizable brand value.

INSIGHT #3
The logo has low recognizability.

Small text and distracting visual elements make the logo blend in to the background, instead of standing out.

INSIGHT #4
Redundant buttons add confusion to the user flow.

Having multiples of the same button visible at various places in the page makes it hard to understand the structure of the website and expected task flow. There is no defined user flow and expected interactions.



2. Specifying user needs 



2.1 User Persona

The primary target audience* of the EBK brand is composed of young, relatively well-off working professionals.
These users tend to have busy schedules, finances to indulge in luxury experiences, and an interest in wellness, beauty, or high end products. They might have an "eye" for design or certain aesthetics, and they try to stay on trend. They value efficiency balanced with creative input, and experiences that are "impressive"— from insta-worthy picture opportunities, to family and friends.

* EBK provided me with existing stats they had on their typical users and clientele.





3. Designing solutions



3.1 Brand Identities
The most important aspect of this project was defining a style guideline that could ensure consistency and a coherent user experience. Not only did it define the final website design, but it can be referred back to as a reference manual as the company and website grows and evolves. This is especially relevant for EBK, given that it is a newer company and is continually and actively growing across mediums.

At this point, I compiled all the research I had done about the brand, its existing users, as well as my client’s preferred wants and needs for her website. Using these elements, I put together three different brand identities for her to review and choose from. I prioritized simplicity, an identifiable color palette, and incorporating pink as a main color. The three options I landed on were 'Friendly and Natural'', 'Classy and Elegant', and 'Playful and Modern.'




4. Final details



4.1 Stylistic details and embellishments
Since one of the initial objectives was to make the website more original and to help it stand out from its competitors, I added subtle embellishments to the page, such as shapes and personalized graphics to the background. The goal here was to not only add personality, but to also strengthen the brand recognizability across mediums. These elements remain muted and understated as to not clutter the page, while simultaneously adding to the overall cohesiveness.


4.1 Color scheme variants
Experimenting with different variants of the chosen color scheme was a good way to visualize the possibilities for the layout, as well as inspire color combinations for future pages. These variants also demonstrated the power of a pre-established color palette and style guide, which proved to be vital tools as I communicated with my client and kept her involved in the design process.



5. Evaluating solutions


5.1 Implementation

In addition to creating the style guides and website mockups, I also implemented the design for her on her hosted website. The overall site had an improved information architecture, cohesive color palette, and recognizable branding from page to page.








6. Testimonial



"Vasuki is an incredibly talented web designer. My goal was to create an aesthetic and trendy website that’s easy to navigate and extremely user friendly. Vasuki was able to conceptualize my vision to transform my website. She worked with me to identify my website’s pain points and provided a variety of suggestions to increase traffic to the site.

• She has an eye for aesthetically pleasing designs and incorporated a variety of appropriate colors and fonts to the site. She made sure the colors and fonts she chose were accessible and easy to read. She also edited all the photos on my site to have one cohesive look.
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• She organized my website’s content into digestible chunks that flowed well with one another. She was then able to create call to actions throughout the site that led to a 10% lower bounce rate.  

• She identified that most visits to my site were through a mobile device but that my website wasn’t mobile friendly. She paid extremely close detail to the way my site operated on a mobile device and made the necessary changes to increase and retain website traffic. The platform doesn’t handle customizations well, so Vasuki went above and beyond to learn the necessary code to ensure my mobile site was running as smoothly as the desktop site.
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Vasuki also spent a lot of time researching my competitors and identifying their pain points, so that we wouldn’t repeat the same mistakes on my site. She understood my goals throughly and created many iterations of the website until I was happy with the final outcome. I’m extremely pleased with the way my website turned out and it’s thanks to Vasuki’s care for detail and her willingness to dig deeper to understand what I needed. Her most valuable asset is that she’s an attentive listener who’s able to see things from multiple perspectives in order to come up with a solution. She balanced my desires as a business owner with what my ideal customer would want to see, to create a beautiful site with increased volumes of traffic."

— Kavya Raman, founder of Events By Kavya