Squarespace
Branding + Visual Identity
Freelance Work
Reef Dweller
Introduction
During my time living on the Hawaiian island of Kaua’i, I was fortunate enough to meet some truly exceptional people during my stay on a local farm. One couple in particular, named Andrew and Celeste, quickly became dear friends from the moment I arrived. Sadly, their departure was just a few days after my own, but the four days we spent together were filled with meaningful connections and cherished moments. Months later, Andrew and Celeste reached out to me knowing about my skills in design and asked for my help in creating the branding and website for their new business which focused on selling ocean-inspired jewelry and reef safe sunscreen.
The Process
ocean-inspired branding
This was the first branding project I’ve done where I’ve really followed a structured process. I’ve done some small branding projects in the past, but have since learnt so much about the branding process while working on these types of projects in agency environments.
For this particular project, I started with sending out a Client & Brand Discovery questionnaire to my client. This discovery form was huge in helping me understand my client and the brand deeply – so I could make more informed decisions about the design and make sure the look, feel, and tone of voice was aligned with the company’s values, target audience and goals.
After I gathered this information from the Client & Brand Discovery, I now had a better idea of where we could take this brand together. The next step was starting to think about the logo design. I started with doing some competitor research – seeing how other jewelry and sunscreen brands portray themselves is great insight into what works and what doesn’t work. I started making a Pinterest board as well where I could dump all of my inspiration. The board was filled with sites, typography, colour, imagery, and illustrations that I liked that I could mix and match ideas from. I like to think of all of the projects I work on as huge collages of everything that I have experienced, love, and am inspired by.
The Process
In addition to online research and Pinterest boards, I took the liberty of actually going to the ocean with my sketchbook and taking inspiration from real life. I drove up to one of my favourite spots along the Sea to Sky highway in BC, and sat there for hours just sketching by the ocean. Paying attention to how the waves ripped, watching seaweed sway in the water, pondering the shells sitting on the shore both whole and broken. All of these little things I use to inform my decisions.
Once I had done a whole lot of sketching, I brought my best ideas into Adobe Illustrator and started translating them into more solid ideas by bringing in fonts, colours, graphic elements etc. Once I landed on my 3 best ideas, I compiled them into a presentation so the client could review them and see which one they felt best represented their brand. They chose an option without any further feedback, and with a few last teeny tiny detailed adjustments, I packaged those logos up for them in a variety of sizes, colours, and filetypes so they could use them everywhere they needed to.
The brand identity I’ve created is very much inspired by the ocean. It’s reflected in the choice of colours – with an ocean blue, a seaweed green, and a sandy tone to really evoke that beachy feeling as you interact with Reef Dweller. The type in the logo is delicate, but slightly curved and flowy like the waves in the ocean. The shell and dots leading your eye into the logo are meant to feel like a shell necklace, a nod to the ocean-inspired jewelry that Reef Dweller offers.
In addition to just providing them the logos, I provided them a small brand guideline so they could understand how their logo, colours, and typography could be used across the brand.
The Process
Reef Dweller’s online space
Once the branding was solidified, I then began to think about how it would translate into the look and feel of Reef Dweller’s new Squarespace website. I wanted the site to feel very light and airy – with large text, beautiful imagery, lots of whitespace, and subtle animations that entice people to explore Reef Dweller.
I worked together with the client to understand their needs for their website – the main goal of course being to encourage people to learn more about their business and to purchase ocean-inspired products. We wanted to keep the website small and simple, just like the business itself. The website features a beautiful homepage, shop page, about page, contact page, and gallery page. The homepage was carefully designed to direct people to other important pages on the site – by first introducing the jewelry, sunscreen, and featured products – and ending with a CTA directing people to shop or to read the Reef Dweller story and to view their posts on Instagram.
The ‘shop’ page beautifully lays out the products in a simple grid, and allows for filtering by product type which makes it easy to find what you’re looking for. Squarespace also offers powerful e-commerce tools that makes it so easy for small business owners to manage their inventory, make sales, and promote their products. The ‘our story’ and ‘gallery’ pages allow people to really learn about Reef Dweller and see their products on real people. These pages are so important because they really bring a sense of credibility and trustworthiness to a new business.
“Thank you so much Nicole! It truly was a pleasure working with you. You took our ideas and brought them to life & the whole process was a lot faster than I expected!! Incredible. The logo and website turned out way better than I expected or had in mind haha 😍
Thank you thank you!!”
The Result
ocean-approved design
The client was absolutely thrilled with the final branding and website, and received a flood of gracious messages pouring in through Instagram. Not only that, but Reef Dweller’s products are enjoying strong and sustained sales through both their online platform and their popular presence at local farmers’ markets. Seeing this small business succeed and knowing that I played a part in its creation fills me with overwhelming happiness.
Please check out and support this small business if you’re interested in what they offer!
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