SEATTLE HAPPY PLACES
Recognizing the unrecognized in good design
Context
Project sponsor: AIGA Seattle Changemaker Series
Project partner: Rosie Sabaric
Seattle Happy Places invites you to find Happy Points in your community that inspire you, bring you joy, and recognize the unrecognized in good design. It debuted as a Partner Program of the 2020 Seattle Design Festival.
Visit seattlehappyplaces.com!
OVERVIEW
Seattle Happy Places is an invitation to be present and recognize places that bring happiness. Good public design evokes positive feelings, such as calm, wonder, elation, hope, and connectedness. In marking these places on a map and by sharing images of these places through social media, the larger Seattle community can help us celebrate these under-appreciated places where design has brought joy. It is about the present and thinking about the future. This initiative is made possible in some ways by the time we are in, and creates a memory of this period in the form of a map.
This project was developed for the 2020 Seattle Design Festival in partnership with the 2020 Changemakers Series, an initiative from AIGA Seattle, reflecting on this year's theme of Mental Health.
This project was a collaboration between me and Rosie Sabaric, with advice, guidance, and support from Kristen Faiferlick and Ken Zinser from the AIGA Seattle Changemaker Series. My primary contributions were developing the brand, graphic, and physical assets, as well as collaborating on the experience design, concept, and strategy.
This project was conducted entirely remotely due to the constraints of COVID, until the very end. We relied on the remote work tool MURAL for several rounds of ideation and synthesis in order to develop the Seattle Happy Places concept and vision for the Seattle Design Festival.
IDEATION
I developed the branding for this project, with critical feedback from Rosie Sabaric, as well as project advisors Ken Zinser and Kristen Faiferlick.
BRANDING
I designed the sign that Rosie and I used to mark the Featured Happy Places during the festival. The sign needed to be tall enough to be seen from down a sidewalk, a block away, but short enough that people would be able to take a picture with it. It needed to be easily transportable to be carried to locations around the city. It needed a small footprint to fit on city sidewalks, but stability in windy areas. We initially considered sandwich boards and other types of signs, but ultimately opted for a cheaper, custom option.
SIGN
DESIGN
Visit SeattleHappyPlaces.com to view the Happy Places Map, our living public record of the spaces in the Seattle area that bring people comfort and joy during challenging times.
SOCIAL
MEDIA
Instagram was our primary method of engagement with our audiences, other than the physical signage. We worked to curate our brand, presence, and interactivity. Follow @SeattleHappyPlaces or the hashtag #SeattleHappyPlaces to see us in action!