The Problem
In its infancy, this nonprofit set an ambitious goal: feel as immediate and human as a voter’s own voice, and as consequential as their representative’s ear. We needed to concept out a visual brand with interactions that would invite folks to explore issues, express their opinion, and connect with their representatives.
Role and Scope
I served as sole visual designer in developing a brand identity, and co-owned product design with the founder. A designer himself, the founder and I set out to concept the interactions that would form the core of the experience.
Designing The Solution
Brand Strategy
Two parallel concepts anchored the brand identity exploration:
Malleable Clay
: A chromatically minimalist choice that inspired a UI which responds to fingerprints, carved signatures, and impressions. This concept reminds users that their every touch leaves a mark. The imagery was minimalist and modern, yet hearkened back to the foundations of civilization.
Time-Worn Parchment
: A palette of neutrals textured with crinkles and paper-grain that calls to mind the founding documents of U.S. democracy. Users “stain” the surface when they vote, grounding them in the permanence of their participation.
Both routes focused on tactility and history, elevating the individual’s voice like a hand in the town hall.
Visual Identity
A restrained palette of warm clay, off-white, and accents of blue and white borrowed from the flag keeps the interface calm.
Typography follows suit: a heritage serif for headers, and a modern sans for legibility in information-dense areas.
Interaction Concepts
Product flows crystallized around two exercises. These were born of iteration, since it was imperative that the experiences teased out curiosity rather than demanding expertise:
Values Map A bubble-map interface lets citizens weigh principles: equity, security, climate, growth. They can inflate and deflate their values to build a living profile that steers their news curation and policy comparisons.
Balance the Budget A draggable ledger exposes real budget line items, but scaled to the user’s own tax liability. Citizens are invited to allocate funds, then compare and contrast with how their representative actually voted, closing the feedback loop.
Each activity is personal and lightweight, yet provides ample opportunity for learning as a side effect of agency.
Values Map A bubble-map interface lets citizens weigh principles: equity, security, climate, growth. They can inflate and deflate their values to build a living profile that steers their news curation and policy comparisons.
Balance the Budget A draggable ledger exposes real budget line items, but scaled to the user’s own tax liability. Citizens are invited to allocate funds, then compare and contrast with how their representative actually voted, closing the feedback loop.
Each activity is personal and lightweight, yet provides ample opportunity for learning as a side effect of agency.
Iteration and Feedback
Feedback rounds raised three issues:
Visual Approachability – The bespoke nature of the clay and parchment motifs risked excluding older demographics. Moving closer to existing UI patterns was our solution to bridging the usability gap.
Era Exploration - The founder wanted to explore dot-matrix inspired design accents. This movement toward a more recent period gave us the opportunity to introduce delightful haptic feedback that echoed punching cards. Users could press, settle, and release for a satisfying tactile experience analagous to the voting booth ritual.
Representative Feedback – After repeating the mantra “make your voice heard”, we realized that we could do just that; a voice-note feature now lets them record an audio message that is sent to their representative.
Representative Feedback – After repeating the mantra “make your voice heard”, we realized that we could do just that; a voice-note feature now lets them record an audio message that is sent to their representative.
Outcome
Our experience transforms abstract civic engagement into a series of tangible actions: reflect on your values, allocate your tax dollars, punch in your vote, let your voice be heard. Most importantly, we’ve created an experience where users will feel spoken with, not spoken to.
Reflection
If revisiting the project, I’d look forward to further finessing the visual design of the Values and Budget flows. Still, the project now stands as a principled, approachable tool for citizens to discover, articulate, and ultimately exercise their voice.