Ginger Snap Hair Studio
Logo, Branding, Website, and Social Media
Introduction
Ginger Snap Hair Studio is a new salon in Pittsburgh, PA. As a previous salon owner who relocated to a new city, it was important for the client, Jessica Schwarz, to build a new client base. The client desired a logo and brand style that fit in with her values of simplicity, approachability and confidence; she differentiates herself from the competition by providing well-rounded services with a more organic, natural style.
The target audience was women in the downtown area aged 25-65, who are looking for fresh yet low-maintenance hair styling.
The challenge with this project was how to showcase Jessica’s talent and bring across her personality to potential clients.
The client has been in the industry for 15+ years, and having owned a salon previously, she has a good grasp on what her clients want. Her old salon had a website with a booking widget, which was popular from both a client perspective for ease of booking and also from a client management perspective, as it saved time for the staff and sent out automatic reminder emails to clients. This is something we planned on bringing into the new website.
As the sole designer working with a business owner, I wore quite a few hats. I did branding design, user research, wireframing, visual design, and implemented the website via WordPress.
Logo and Branding Design
I designed a logo and developed a visual brand style for Ginger Snap that encapsulates their brand values and inspires the customer to book with the salon. The overall goal is for the target audience to feel inspired and welcomed.
The logo and color palette are 70’s inspired, which feel warm, lighthearted, and confident. The artwork has plenty of texture and a nod to nature, which ties in to Ginger Snap’s values of approachability and creativity. The artwork brings a sense of harmony and flow, and is flexible for future use.
The client wanted the brand to visually stand out from other salons in the area who favor a minimal aesthetic. After creating a moodboard that nailed down the client’s vision for her brand, I designed a logo and brand art style that can be used as a pattern in different materials. I’ve established a set of 25+ social posts to be integrated with her portfolio of hair photos on Instagram. These carry through the brand style onto social media with illustrations, color, and texture. From there, I moved into the research phase for the website.
Research
I conducted interviews, surveys, and user testing in the research stage. View the project on my website for more details on the research phase.
Wireframes & UI Design
At the beginning of my design process I created wireframes for testing purposes. After initially sketching out the IA and overall page structure, I used Figma to make a low-fidelity prototype. Click here to view the mobile prototype. View the project on my website for more details on this phase.
Final Thoughts
This project was an opportunity for me to bring a brand to life from scratch, working not only on branding design but also website design. It was challenging to be the only designer on the project and conduct the research on my own, but it was a great opportunity to learn and adapt throughout the process.
It can also be challenging designing something for an independent business owner because their identity feels tied to the brand, but this also makes it incredibly rewarding when the client loves the result. I believe we succeeded in establishing a style that captures Ginger Snap’s brand personality as well as launching a website that provides users with a pleasant experience that encourages them to book an appointment.
The next steps for this project are to monitor the site via Google Analytics and collect additional feedback from clients. These could inform how we can make improvements to the site and continue the iterative design process.
