CITISPIRE 2.0 +
#WEB DESIGN #UX/UI #BRANDING #MULTIMEDIA
Exploring and showcasing a visionary brand's identity in 2022 - .....
CITISPIRE is a 21st century architectural firm with more than 25 years of experience behind its back. The company focuses on building real, meta and integrated environments that put the human values first.
The pandemic has had a huge impact on the future of architecture and has opened up many exciting opportunities for creating more engaging environments. With the rise of metaverse many of the limitations of the real world will become non-existent, and creates a new occupation of "world builder" whose superpower is imagination.
At the same time the advancement of IoT technologies make it possible to make real spaces more exciting, sensitive and interactive, creating a new occupation of "architecht" whose super power is intelligence.
Founded by renowned architects and innovators, CITISPIRE's spectrum covers developments from real, integrated to meta, and has during the past years been working on developing smart cities and large-scale resorts in Southeast Asia.
The goal of the project was to elevate the current brand, define its place in the future environment and communicate it to the global audience.
The Role and Process
At CITISPIRE branding my role was to work together with the executive team to develop new services and elevate brand-identity based on the future market demands, and communicating the upgraded brand identity to the world via web and multimedia design, and branding content creation.
The process started with brainstorming sessions that led to research on market environments, technical tools available now and in the future, existing service providers, and much more.
After all the foundational had been established, I engineered the workflow plots for different services and company's functions, and started working on translating the ideas into literal, visual and multimedia content.
Building an online home
When it comes to building websites I see each site as a home. A well designed home tells a story about its owners aesthetics, values and personality, and has an element that catches the eyes of passers-by, leaving them wanting to step in and meet you.
(Entering the 2.0 web design process was a bit different this time: I decided to apply the attitude of building a very solid and sustainable website while knowing that the concept of websites might change into something way more immersive very soon thanks to the coming of metaverse.)
Design concept
As having collaborated with CITISPIRE for years, their minimalist and futurist aesthetics but sophisticated philosophy were well-known to me, there was plenty of inspiration for first drafts and wireframes after the first meeting,
I personally like to present a selection of 2-3 conceptual options to make sure that the "homeowner" would feel have their freedom of choice, and feel fully included in the process. Indeed, it is always a pleasure to design for and with creatives, as there is always a lot of care and passion involved when it comes to getting the "identity" right, and plenty of ideas that inspire my designs further.
And by "creatives" I mean "everyone" as I believe there is a creative spirit within each of us, that is ready to speak out, when providing a safe space - which has always been my main goal throughout each process.
Moving forward
After the concept and fire frames had been approved I moved forward to creating a prototype of the website that went through reviews and test sessions, until it was ready to enter the development process.
Testing it out
As the website included a lot of visual content and was mainly destined for engineer and developer types it was crucial to make sure these types of people understand that visual language, or if there could be something to be adjusted. The testers were mainly engineers and general audience from different nationalities, including non-English speakers.
Launch an repeat
When I am working I like to concentrate myself on one project at a time, whenever it is possible. As this was an option and the deadlines allowed, I could afford keeping working on the desktop and mobile versions separate.
As consistency and comfort are two things that really influence the user experience a lot, my goal was to keep the mobile version as similar as possible to the web version, and tell stories where the information given is prioritized from top to bottom.
I usually like to keep the mobile-versions foolproof and functional so that running into slowdowns due large data size would be very unlikely. Yet, this time, as the video content was important to the client we reduced the sizes for the mobile and it gave good results during testing sessions, we decided to go for that option.
The Challenges
Communicating information for a very diverse group of clients
As CITISPIRE's clients range from individuals to governments and include non-English speaking clients, the language, both verbally and visually needed to be universal without losing identity.
Solution: As a design solution I ended up communicating through a color - code where metaverse services and projects are presented within a black environment and real services in simple white.
As metaverse services need to carry a "cool" message, black is a good color to give out that message.
I used a lot of icons and symbols to make the site comprehensible for audiences from around the world, and give CITISPIRE's projects a lot of visual space in form of large - size galleries - as they are the main stars of the website and their beautiful colors will stand out when placed within a neutral background.
How to say all you want to say without saying too much?
CITISPIRE is definitely not a traditional architectural/tech firm.
Within its office in Upper Manhattan it features a recital hall, gallery, exhibitions, and hosts an art school for young designers and artists,
It has its own thoroughly developed philosophy THRIVE that prioritizes inspiration and personal growth within a community. This place in NYC is called CITISPIRE Studio.
For a long time we were looking for ways how to include the studio into the website without distracting the visitors. Eventually, we created a separate website for CITISPIRE Studio that features the cultural happenings and program, and links into our main website in a humble way.
Entering the metaverse
The Facebook/Meta opened up its future plans to the internet to enter the metaverse, many things changed for companies around the world. So far the "meta" had been a possible direction for the future, a hypothesis, but suddenly the ship sped up and gave businesses a message to get ready to enter this other dimension or "?".
This all did not come as a surprise for us but definitely defined a new pace and urgency to find answers to the questions that many of us may be asking. What is metaverse? Will it ever have one definition? How it /they will be like? Will it ever be centralized? What will be technologically possible within the next 5 years? Who will participate? Is the world ready? amongst many others.
This all required thorough research in history, world's demographics, and being up-to date with all the latest tech news, that all can give clues about the future. If typically, " I don't know", is not accepted as an answer and indicates to a lack of research/knowledge, I believe that we are at a point in history where "I don't know", is once a legitimate answer, but not the end of the conversation. "I don't know" inspires a new question : "If we cannot tell for sure what the others want, what do we want?" . How do we imagine the future? What are the things we want to take with us to metaverse and what we want to leave behind? Why does the metaverse need us?What kind of magic do we have to offer?
I believe that the concept of metaverse is at a point where we all have the power to participate in its shaping process, and everyone with a vision should speak out. If there will ever be a singular metaverse, creating a collaborative and democratic environment from the beginning, is crucial for its health and sustainability.
One is for sure, during the times of transition, where companies have a chance to be reborn in another dimension - it is crucial to find and define your core values, strengths and make sure they come along and are expressed wherever we go.
Thus, instead of keeping our direction in sectet until it is completely launch - ready, we decided to speak out on the topic and participate in co-creating this new environment, valuing each idea that sources from our core values, such as culture, security, well-being, and enhancing creative economies.
Lessons to take
Adapt and apply a welcoming attitude towards change
When I started collaborating wih CITISPIRE two years ago it was a company with an extensive architectural experience behind its back taking on massive projects.
Just within a year the whole industry changed due to the pandemic - and the company needed to go through a big shift. In a way, as an innovation-driven company, we were all excited for the new opportunities and saw the decided to see the positive consequences of the pandemic that led the digital and tech industries to a fast progress.
Without that attitude, it is very hard to move forward and keep motivated.
Be okay with abandoning the shell
Currently, at the launch stage of CITISPIRE 2.0 site, I can say it communicates the ideas to the general audience. Yet, I know that it will be the matter of a year, or mostly two when traditional websites as we know today will have an additional medium in form of more immersive solutions that would be relevant in metaverse.
By building a web environment it is easy to become emotionally attached but in the fast-paced world, it is necessary to hold tight on your core but not on the shell.
Inspire your team
As an artist and creative director of a fantasy brand it is fairly easy for me to exist within a space where gravity is not a boundary and imagination is the currency. There were times when creating metaverse buildings became not-so-easy for our great architects who naturally use the tools of imagination slightly differently. Yet, often, all you need is a 10-minute conversation that crosses the borders of science fiction and fantasy to program our minds thing differently. Creativity like this is a team effort, and so is navigating towards a new direction.