What I loved in Design this month| April 2024
All the visual identities I interacted with and loved last month and what makes them good or doesn’t….
This article is arranged in chronological order of my experience. It’s not arranged based on how much I liked some design.
Kruti Coffee wall art
I recently visited a cafe of Kruti Coffee and noticed this beauty. I’ve known the brand Kruti Coffee for quite a few years now and I was aware that they have good branding…. ☕️
What I liked
Besides their overall brand design, this wall of the new cafe was interesting. Kruti incorporates the folk art style from Odisha into its branding pretty well. And in this wall art, the coffee brewing machinery has also been illustrated in tribal style. Hence they feel very much a part of the illustrations…. 👏
WhatsApp avatar builder
As a brand designer, I’m a sucker for customization. So, I love playing around with avatars. Recently, WhatsApp introduced an avatar maker in the app and it’s great…. 👏
What I like
The two things I loved the most about it are:
1. How close the generation of the avatar was based on a selfie….
2. The diversity of cultural clothing options available….
I have a very public profile and I use my own photo everywhere. But I also create avatars wherever possible so that even my emojis are custom. Yeah, me and branding is a better love story than Twilight…. 😌
Lay’s Heartiez packaging
LAYS is an example of you not needing to experiment with your branding if you are big enough and have a good enough foundation.…
What I don’t like
The Heartiez series from Lay’s has one of the most generic packaging designs I’ve seen. Remove the logo and you’ll have no clue who this is from…. 😅
It tastes good enough though. An interesting design element they have in this packaging is on the back side of it…. 🍟
IPL checkered board
I might be an Indian but I don’t follow sports, not even cricket. But I’m very aware that it is the IPL season. So, while I was having my dinner at a restaurant, this caught my eye…. 👀
What I don’t like
Checkered board designs are usually bad, but this is one of the worst designs I’ve seen. Imagine having crores of budget and still you end up with this. This fails on every basic concept of design. It has terrible spacing, contrast and hierarchy…. 🏏
Slack huddle callout
Here’s a screenshot from a huddle on Slack. If you hover on your avatar during a Slack huddle, you’ll get this callout that says “You look nice today”…. 😎
What I like
A callout pointing out that it’s you is functionality. But adding a compliment is a delight. It brings a smile to your face. It gives regular users something new to discover. It gives people something to talk about on the topic of the platform. That leads to word-of-mouth marketing, the strongest form of marketing…. 🌟
Delighting your audience is the best branding hack you can utilize.
Nutriboat packaging
I’ve been seeing this Nutriboat product almost every week while doing my weekly grocery shopping. But it took me a long time to finally decide to buy it. That’s because the packaging didn’t feel attractive at all…. 😅
Concerns
I finally bought it when I ran out of new things to try I had tried another Nutriboat product last month. And the product ended up tasting good…. 😋
But most people don’t see your product multiple times and finally buy it. Most people don’t find it attractive once and never think about giving it a shot. Besides the bad choice of typeface, it lacks contrast and hierarchy. It’s very difficult to read half of the information on the pack and that’s bad for business…. 😌
Can you read everything on this packaging design…? 🤓
Better generic than bad
This is the third Nutriboat product I’ve bought. And while it’s not my favourite product in terms of taste, it has the best packaging design. Yeah, it has a very generic design. In case you are wondering where you’ve seen it before, this style of typography is very popular in moto vlogs…. 🤓
But things become generic when they become a safe option that works. While I always push for taking calculated risks to establish your brand identity, it is better to go with something that works than something that doesn’t in your efforts to be different. The goal is to be recognizable by developing a unique visual identity. But till you can do that right, it is better to go with a safe generic option…. 💰
Woolah Tea packaging design
I bought Woolah Tea because I like how they are solving the tea bag problem in a smart sustainable way…. 🍵
What I like
Unsurprisingly they also have a good packaging design. The pack highlights the USPs without being too busy. The hierarchy guides your eyes through the important information fluidly. And the colour combination creates a default good contrast…. 👏
I like how they’re utilizing their packaging to showcase their values and certifications aesthetically. The typography is also on point…. ☕️
Some concerns
There are a few minor issues with how some of the shapes form and how they compete for attention. But staying true to their promise of sustainable design, they are going through their older packaging instead of throwing them away. There’s also a little bit of a kerning issue. But I’m sure they’ve fixed these minor issues in the new packaging…. 🫖
Bingo Mad Angles packaging
Bingo Mad Angles from ITC is one of my favourite guilty pleasures. Their [relatively] recent rebranding of the packaging is almost perfect. And that almost part bothers me. It has much better contrast, hierarchy and recognizability compared to the version it replaced. But it has some misses…. 🍟
Concerns
It’s the typography and readability associated with it. The choice of colour and stylization is further hurting its overall design. The name and flavour names are hard to read and form a very conflicting shape competing with the triangle of the chips…. 🤷🏽
Sepoy & Co. packaging design
I recently bought these mixers from SEPOY&CO. And as you can see, these are beautifully designed. They also cost lotta more than average mixers. But since they come in a great packaging design, I had no second thoughts about the price…. 🍷
What I like
The aesthetics of the design language also helps it stand apart from competitors on the shelves. Even with all the flair, it is very readable and I know exactly what I’m buying. Plus the addition of cursive gives it a handmade feel. And these do taste great as well. So, I’ll most probably buy them again…. 🥃
SEPOY&CO. has multiple versions of their logo besides the primary wordmark. This allows them to use their logo on multiple different locations in their already beautiful packaging. Since they are not using the same logo again and again, it doesn’t feel monotonous or overwhelming…. ✌️
Heart-shaped traffic light
I came across this cute traffic light while stuck in a traffic jam in Bengaluru. The second part of the sentence is way more common than it should be…. 🥲
What I like
But the first part of the sentence made me smile. It made me forget my frustration of being stuck in a traffic jam for a while. And what did it cost the government? A little more than the cost of a regular traffic light cover…? ❤️
UX lessons are everywhere if know where to look…. 🤓
This is a self-taught multidisciplinary creative hooman and a veracious empath who loves branding. Besides strategic aesthetics, I take a keen interest in philosophy, psychology and exploring new experiences beyond the superficial….
You can book a mentorship or consultation session with me on ADPList or TopMate….
Through my 6+ years of experience as a designer, I’ve built and led multi-disciplinary teams, worked with 80+ clients [such as Indian Oil and KIIT], won awards [such as Odisha Skills] and got my works featured by international organizations [such as the World Brand Design Society and DesignRush]. I’ve helped companies get funding, million+ traction and 10k+ subscribers through the right branding. I can help you to combine strategy with aesthetics to make a positive impact….
