Ellie
Naming and visual identity for an organization that provides guidance services for parents and guardians to effectively communicate with their children about cancer, through counseling, publications, and workshops.
Research, Naming, Visual Identity Design
Cancer is a difficult time, especially for children and teenagers. Whether it is a child or teen suffering from cancer or has a loved one who is, it is challenging to communicate about the situation and their feelings.
Children and teenagers of different age groups need to be talked to differently. For instance, children, particularly those under 10 years old, often worry about things like causing cancer or catching it. Not talking to them or hiding the situation from them can cause more fear and confusion. It is necessary to carefully and thoughtfully navigate this with them. Ellie provides assistance to families to emotionally support the children through these difficult times.
THE CHALLENGE
Since Ellie is an organization that ultimately caters to children, I wanted its visual identity to be playful and comforting, in contrast to the heavy topic of cancer.
The biggest challenge while designing the visual language was to toe the line between it being too serious and it being offensively playful.
TYPEFACE > LOGOTYPE
Logotype Inspiration: Janger.
The logo, like the name, adds a soothing, friendly character to lighten the heavy context of cancer.
Color Palate
Secondary Typeface
Since each age range of children requires different level of communication, after some research, I decided to narrow down my audience further to design specific applications. The presented applications are initial ideations and prototypes.
Age Range: 8-13 year olds
BOOK OF FEELINGS
A small guide defining the basic emotions (in context to cancer) that will help children figure out what they are feeling. The guide accompanies a journal in which the children can write, draw, doodle about their emotions. I also designed a few stickers as another medium of expression for children to use in the journal.
Stickers included in the book to add another way of communicating
GLOSSARY
A pocket-size glossary of cancer-related terms which parents/guardians can use to talk to children about cancer.
