Freya Travel App: The Process
In our last branding module, our class was given the challenge of taking a section of Craigslist and turning it into its own stand-alone app. For example, some of my classmates went broader with swap and fitness apps, while others were more specific with gardening services and vinyl record apps. I went the broader route and looked at housing swaps and, ultimately, vacation rentals. This blog post highlights just a bit of the process I went through. I will talk more about the final product in another blog post.
Figuring Out A Name
This was probably the hardest part for me. It took me a few days, plenty of thesaurus websites, and quite a bit of research. Eventually, through some Google searches about female travelers and explorers, I came across Dame Freya Stark. She has written dozens of books and essays and is said to be one of the first non-Arabs to travel through the Arabian Desert. This gave me my “second” wind and it felt like the ideas started flowing.
What is Neomorphism?
In class, our teacher introduced this new trend of neomorphism. Basically, instead of Material cards that “float” above the page, neomorphic cards are kind of “pushed out” of the page. To me, it’s equal parts cool and creepy. I looked into it a bit more. One article I found, basically said that while neomorphism is a hot new trend for 2020, it won’t entirely replace the need for Material design. This is because it’s not always the most accessible or effective for CTAs, buttons, etc. So I decided to incorporate it sparingly into my design.
The Logo
Landing on a final logo is usually one of my bigger hurdles when it comes to branding. However, this one came a bit more easily due to the inspiration from Freya Stark. During my research, one quote from Freya stood out:
“Surely, of all the wonders of the world, the horizon is the greatest.”
The logo I created is based on classic horizon line imagery, with a second one just above it. This icon also has the opportunity to have different images inside of it. It is simple, but holds significance to the idea of travel and is also fairly easy to recognize without being extremely complex.
