This five to six week project consisted of choosing a brand that I felt needed a redesign of their current brand identity and with that build brand Guidelines/system in order to communicate what that redesigned brand is about and their rules and regulations on the usage of their logo, typography, color, core purpose and statement, brand applications and much more. 

As I felt that the international retail store H&M needed to have a separate identity in order to communicate their line of baby and kid’s clothing, I went through the process of defining through research, discovering through sketches, image assets and visual experimentation, designing digital variations, and creating mockups. An important element I was motivated to maintain through this project is storytelling through symbolism and meaning.

The primary audience for this project was mainly parents of children for the reason that they are the ones who end up making the decisions to take their children to these stores, choosing what they want to buy with for them, and mostly having the experience  in the store with the redesigned identity. In meeting those needs, H&M kids provides a kids corner

where children can play while parents shop. The clothes/fabric are of good quality with fashion-

forward prints/designs that are long lasting. It’s a mixture of fashionable clothes with affordable

prices and frequent discounts/sales. However, although the secondary audience are the children, I kept going back and forth on this because the children’s needs are also met with the things in the store, collaborating with certain movie/TV show characters that appeal to kids and designing prints/patterns they would love and relate, a kid-friendly environment with a kids corner (to be entertained), reachable items, kids mannequins, etc.

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At first, I didn’t even know what a brand system was nor knew that almost every company has one but was interested in knowing more about its setup and purpose. Some brands have very defined guidelines and the one I found of H&M is straightforward and more particularly focuses on the changes made to their logo. I did find another one referred to as “They H&M Way” which speaks on their core purpose, big idea and values and what they mean by “The H&M Way”.

Although it may seem easy, it was difficult trying to sketch out only three characters. My go to idea was something rounded and more kid-friendly, steering away from the serif idea and it lowly evolved to a dynamic one sort of like the original but in bubble form. I then added “kids” and emphasized that more than “H&M”.

Some of the first few experiments were picking colors and finding the right type of font for the logo. I noticed that with a dynamic mark, it would’ve been ideal for a sketch to be used to give it that handwritten feel, however, I felt like I was imitating the original logo too much. I wanted to steer away from that and a few things that had inspired me were the Pampers and baby einstein logo. I wanted the logo to give emphasis on kids and still in a sense have it be connected to the original H&M, but that drastically changed later on to having it be its own mark competing with other baby/kids brands.

After going with this dynamic bubble font and sizing up the kids to give it more importance, figuring out the color palette was going to be one of the main element that would give this brand its identity for the reason that these colors were going to symbolize the icons and values of the brand. It was also one of the things that were going to catch the attention of the kids aesthetically. In searching for the right color palette, I came across one that I felt looked aesthetically pleasing but also could be used to represent these “I AM” statements that I then formed to create an even more developed identity for this brand.

The icons represent the I AM sentences and each is assigned the color for a reason. The adjectives spell out kids to establish a more symbolic identity. The “i” in “kids” was changed to a superhero figure so children can use that as a representation that they (“I am a superhero/superpower”) are a superhero with superpowers. This was all inspired by the new tagline “Empowering kids through clothing”.

When it came to creating variations the logo, icons, patterns, etc., everything had to make sense and have a purpose. The icons are five adjectives/nouns that I felt are important to empowering a kid. I then took that concept throughout the brand guide to communicate and organic feel and create dynamic movement to embody this idea of empowering kids and in general a family-friendly atmosphere. I did this by adding contrasting break pages of alternating colors from the logo, hierarchy through size and color for titles, icons, and other content to keep the viewer interested and involved.

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Creating mockups and brand applications really helps to put your designs into perspective. However, the difficult part is in trying to find a mockup that displays the parts that you want to place your designs in based on your vision. Especially when my brand is so particular, it was difficult finding the perfect store that has a large enough sign and if able to see through the store, have it be of children’s clothing. Also, when I was creating the website for my brand, looking at different elements and studying the best user experience through a website was something new for me. When creating an experience, you have to make sure someone is able to easily navigate through it and be able to identify and understand each convention. This is also a big part in a successful brand identity

The website should include all the primary colors of the brand and should very clear and understanding to navigate. All this has to be on a white background

(LEFT) Wayfiniding like this works best if both the pattern and brand name in original colors are as displayed to make connections and create familiarity.

(RIGHT) Wayfinding should always include either the brand name and/or pattern, depending on the image.

(LEFT) Store packaging should be clean and use any of the patterns from pg. 20. The name of the brand should be displayed in front on the package.

(RIGHT) Shopping bags should look fun and colorful. The entire bag should be white and have one of patterns on it from pg. 20 in the manner displayed above.

Facebook posts will be pictures of Ads or pictures of new products. They will be linked with our website so viewers can buy directly from Facebook. Posts will be repostable

Instagram posts will be very similar to Facebook. Pictures will have linked products with our website so viewers can buy directly from Instagram. Posts will be repostable