Creative Leader. Brand Strategist. Designer. Living in Austin, TX
Spiceworks Illustration Style
Team Members
Matt Kohn
Creative Direction, Art Direction, Planning
Sarah Pedregon
Creative Lead and Illustration
Ryan Lewis, Ryan Vatzlavick
Design and Illustration
Tags
Creative Direction, Illustration, Branding, Design
We laid out the reasoning for an update and presented it to the rest of the executive leadership. You can see we had great design but several directions on illustration style and nothing that represented us as a whole. This all caused a lack of consistency across our content.
We then set our sights on researching the rest of the tech space and specifically the IT space. We found examples of companies we believed were doing a good job to help illustrate our need.
Designer: Sarah Pedregon
We presented three explored styles all which we thought met the goals of updating the look to something more updated and unique within the IT space.
We broke each into Icons, spot illustrations and scene illustration which included people. We showed how these could be used on current properties to create the overall consistency.
Designer: Ryan Lewis
We put 3 designers working under my creative direction on the task of these explorations. We experimented with infographics, email banners, ads, printed pieces.
Designer: Ryan Vatzlavick
We knew wanted to make these illustrations feel personal and one way we were experimenting with that was to make it feel hand drawn. We nicknamed this style the sharpie style.
The team eventually landed on illustration style 1. We have slowly been expanding the style and building guidelines around usage and how we build the illustrations.
A full responsive event website driving users to find out more info, see the full agenda, or register for the event. Created with Graphic Designer Luke Etheridge.
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Built within the Spiceworks Community this is a holiday page layout and design. Celebrating the annual World Backup Day.
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A full event conference responsive website with an animated video background enticing users to find our more info, watch the event video or register for the event.
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Taking the old into the new we updated to a fully responsive personal experience and re designed the whole homepage and marketing pages connected with www.spiceworks.com. Designed with Designer Bryce Hays for Spiceworks.
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Above are 2 updated ideas for our weekly newsletter going out to over 3 million users. One was heavy on imagery and the other was a lean text version.
Project Timeline
September 2015 – October 2015
Team Members
Matt Kohn
Art Direction, Design
Chris Mann
Project Owner, Beer Maker
Tags
Art Direction, Beer Design, Illustration, Project Management
The Challenge
Each year we try and expand our foot hold on the EMEA region of IT Pros included in the millions of IT pros doing their day to day. Our marketing manager wanted a fun and creative way to interact with our community and the folks coming to our booth during one of the largest IT conferences around Interop during October.
The Solution
We came up with the solution in the form of a campaign called Spicetoberfest. Imagine lederhosen beer and funny hats! As part of that campaign we ran a contest in the community and had the winners attend a day brewing beer with Hillside Brewery, a local family owned brewery in London. They got to pick a community-voted description and try and make it a reality which is how Spicy Brew v1.2 was born.
The final production was limited to 700 bottles and given away at multiple meetups, as well as our annual user conference.
SPICEWORLD 2017
Project Timeline
August 2017 – October 2017
Team Members
Matt Kohn
Creative Direction, Art Direction, Planning, Lead Design
Diana Berno
Hub Planning and Hub Art Direction
Luke Etheridge, Jenn Lindeman, Justin Owens, Sarah Pedregon, Ryan Lewis, Nicole Burg, Cameron Miller
Design, Illustration
Andrew Baron
Copywriting
Roy Pena
Video Editing
Dana Moberly, Elisa Gladu, Todd Darroca
Project Owners and Event Planners
Tags
Creative Direction, Event Design, Illustration, Signage, Production Planning, Presentation Design, Project Management
The Challenge
SpiceWorld: Every year since 2008, Spiceworks has hosted an annual user conference. It has grown in attendance year over year, and demands a fresh look and feel with each event (while remaining on budget). In 2017, the conference moved to a new section of the Austin Convention Center.
The Solution
We launched a signage plan by walking through the space and planning the user experience, adding additional pieces based on ideas we saw throughout the year.
I used these guidelines to oversee a team hard at work on design and production design. It was all with the aim to ensure we got everything delivered on time and with a consistent look and feel.
We grew the event to 1550+ registrants, many of whom journeyed from outside the country to experience the most happening tech conference on earth.
We started with a basic set of brand guidelines to help consistency across the project and event.
The brand then moved into our first produced piece for the event in the website. The website is meant to get IT pros and Tech marketers the info they need to attend the event.
Our annual promotional video.
In network and out of network ads. Optimized and A B tested to ensure best results.
We kept the theme going throughout every touch point of the event bringing the look and feel to life. We also included our 10 year mark to re-emphasize or anniversary branding.
We needed a way to bring to life a long stretch of hallway. We came up with a graffiti wall that users could stop and add their mark. We also showed the history of the event along the bottom.
We also get to design the entire exhibit hall and Spiceworks booth property. I provided creative direction working with lead designer Diana Berno on this part of the project.
Project Timeline
September 2015 – October 2016
Team Members
Matt Kohn
Creative Direction, Art Direction, Planning, Design, Illustration
Luke Ethridge
Co-Art Direction, Lead Design, Illustration
Marivi Delgado, Julian Hector, Amanda Trudeau, Diana Berno, Clarice Bajowski, Jenn Lindeman, Justin Owens, Sarah Dilts
Design
Andrew Baron
Copywriting
Roy Pena
Video Editing
Dana Moberly, Elisa Gladu, Todd Darroca
Project Owners
Tags
Creative Direction, Event Design, Illustration, Signage, Production Planning, Presentation Design, Project Management
The Challenge
Each year Spiceworks hosts their annual user conference in London and Austin for IT pros and tech marketers. Our goal is to create an intimate un-conference like experience for our users with a new look and feel all while maintaining double growth year over year. From signage planning to main stage show production creative oversight was needed throughout.
The Solution
We started with a brand guideline development early on to ensure consistency and build guidelines across both events. We visited the sites of both venues several times early on to build signage lists and see the space for planning. We also built an illustrated set of graphics early on for easy usage across multiple pieces. We made use of location specific iconography to set the events apart and also made use of a naming system between cities.
On the left you will see examples of signage and creative throughout both events in Austin and London.
