Sarradet Case Study
Crafting a design system for the Sarradet Metaverse.
We had the pleasure of partnering with Sarradet., a digital publication focused on reviving the fashion industry through creating virtual stores. You can explore these virtual stores on any device — including AR (Artificial Reality) compatibility on phones or VR headsets. Sarradet. are innovators that are pushing the fashion game forward.
Sarradet. had a clear vision on what their brand was and represented, but needed an agency that was capable of bringing it to life — so we at Mighty Fine did just that.
The end result was a rock-solid branding foundation for Sarradet. to build on — including touching up their logo to make it more unique to them, establishing branding guidelines, developing an iconography system, and motion graphics.
LOGO TOUCH-UP
Starting with the visual foundation — the logo.
We always recommend starting the branding process with your logo as the benchmark for all of your visual branding efforts. So we began the process by tweaking the existing Sarradet logo. While their original wordmark looked good, we knew it could even better represent the pillars that define the Sarradet brand: feminine, bold, fluid, and quirky. And from a technical standpoint, it could also be tweaked a bit further to display more clearly at small sizes.
In order to achieve that effect, we altered the wordmark to feature more rounded, curvaceous letterforms. We also enforced better consistency in letterforms that didn’t work quite as well as we knew they could. Lastly, we made sure to make the thinner parts of the font just a bit bolder.
DESIGN SYSTEMS
Crafting the foundation for the Sarradet brand.
Branding Guidelines
It’s crucial for any brand to develop a set of brand guidelines — consistency is always key. We created a branding guideline system the Sarradet team could follow to ensure consistency in all of their endeavors. Additionally, they’re also able to share the document with anyone they decide to work with in the future.
One of the features that makes the Sarradet brand experience unique is that it features a constantly shifting main color palette between virtual storefronts. As such, we needed to make sure every other element within the brand guidelines was locked down so the experience wouldn’t feel disjointed going from one color palette to another.
Iconography System
Sarradet’s virtual storefronts revolve around navigating a virtual “space”. So much like navigating a museum for the first time, wayfinding is absolutely necessary. By wayfinding, we refer to the action of spatial problem solving — how to get from A to B. As such, we developed a system of easily recognizable icons that could be universally understood by anyone, regardless of their age or background.
The challenge in this was to balance detail with legibility. Since these icons are meant to display on a variety of platforms (PCs, Tablets, Phones), it was critical that they were able to be visually distinguishable on every screen. However, the team at Sarradet loves to have fun — which is something we love about them. So while Plain Jane icons are great for being clear and legible, they don’t exactly convey the Sarradet brand. The team at Mighty Fine synthesized these concepts into a system of icons that accomplished both fun and fun(ction). Who says you can’t have your cake and eat it too?
MOTION GRAPHICS
It’s alive! Putting the Sarradet brand into motion.
Lastly, as part of the initial brand launch, we were tasked with creating motion graphics for their virtual experiences and storefronts. These short and sweet animations are played while the page loads — which helps with the perceived loading time for the end-user and gives them a little taste of the Sarradet brand before they load in.
