TENNESSEE STATE UNIVERSITY — Student Housing

BACKGROUND

During the capstone course of my design program, I was paired with 2 of my peers and an architecture firm to assist their client, Tennessee State University, with an issue they were facing— an increasing demand for housing to accommodate their growing student body. My team was tasked with creating a visual identity, logos, construction wraps, and exterior and interior design for this project. Since this would be private, off-campus student housing, we were given creative freedom rather than adhering to the university's branding.

A fraternity monument on Greek Row.

The housing construction site.

A plaque describing the history of Tennessee State University.

A mural at the entrance of a parking garage in downtown Nashville.

Honky tonk signs on Broadway.

A mural on the side of a building near Broadway.

At the beginning of the project, the architecture firm held a site visit to Nashville where we had the chance to visit the city, university, and construction site. This provided an opportunity to put our project into context as we started our research.

As we researched design elements, as well as inspiration for our logos and visual identity, we leaned heavily into Nashville culture and African heritage. For the naming that our logos would utilize, we looked at Nashville figures, customs, landmarks, and history. For design elements, we drew from traditional African quilts and the patterns they contained.

The color palette we chose was ultimately something that was intended to express heritage, history, community, and excitement. To enhance our designs, we decided to utilize traditional Adinkra symbols as visual motifs.

Bayard

Sentient

Our display typeface, Bayard, was designed by Vocal Type, a foundry which creates fonts inspired by social justice and civil rights history. Our secondary typeface, Sentient, was designed by Indian Type Foundry, and we felt its classical serif composition served as both a contrast to Bayard and a representation of the academic side of the college experience.

FINAL DESIGNS

As we finalized our designs, we aimed to give each building a unique name and a combined name for both, with logos inspired by Nashville's music scene. For the construction wraps, we drew inspiration from traditional African quilts, which influenced other deliverables like stairwell designs and wayfinding. We also developed additional deliverables for the project, such as social media and merchandise.

LOGOS