Danielle Blue | Moonshot

Visual identity and event collateral to celebrate and promote the Moonshot innovators and facilitate connection with other Baltimore businesses.

Client
T. Rowe Price Foundation

Audience
Moonshot Innovators, Baltimore-based Entrepreneurs and executives, T. Rowe Price and Baltimore Corps program participants and alumni, and community partners.

Services
Design, Art Direction, Website, Email, Invitation Suite, Booklet, Event Collateral, PowerPoint, Video

Contribution
Creative Direction, Art Direction, Design

Objectives

Creative Problem Solving Used to Drive Business Outcomes

Challenge
The Moonshot program is a new venture for T. Rowe Price that aligns with the firm's and foundation's committment to advancing racial equity and social justice within Baltimore. A visual identity was needed to foster excitement with program participants, prospective attendees, and promote the event that will showcase the innovators and facilitate additional connection with various Baltimore businesses that are interested in accerlating social change in the city.

Solution
We felt that in order to do the Moonshot program justice, the most viable concept for the visual identity is a commissioned artwork from a Baltimore-based artist that could be leveraged for all of the materials. Once an artist was indentified and produced the artwork, a multi-discipline team, consisting of design, video, events, digital, email, and more, formed to develop various assets and partner with the Foundation to identify additional touchpoints and coordinate with Baltimore-based vendors.

T. Rowe Price associates, alumni, and community members in attendance

of Event attendees noted their interest in Baltimore-based innovators and entrepreneurs has “greatly increased”

of Event attendees reported making meaningful connections through Moonshot

Moonshot participants reported an increased sense of pride, excitement, and hope in Baltimore’s future

Llyod Vennie filming a Moonshot attendee.

A banner stand at the event with the Moonshot design.

Danielle Blue and Mike Worozbyt filming the Moonshot event

The Moonshot reception with a presentation presentated on the wall.

Concept Development

When commissioning the artwork, we wanted to be sure the output is representative of the values of the intiative: collaboration, innovation, and partnership.

A collection of the artist research documentation slides.

01.

Research and interview artists.

Prior to making contact with potential artists, we determined what our selection criteria would be (local to baltimore, strong community ties, diverse styles, artists of color and/or diverse backgrounds). From there, we researched several local artists that met the criteria and created a presentation deck to share with our Foundation partners. Within the deck, we outlined our selection process, shared mockups of how the art could be applied to help them visualize how the concept could come to life, and shared the artist statments and samples. Then, we contacted and interviewed several of the artists.

A collection of the infomational slides we provided to the artist.

02.

Select artist and provide direction.

We were able to commission a fantastic muralist, Jaz Erenberg. The direction we gave was to be true to her unique style while also being cohesive with T. Rowe Price brand elements, which would be packaging the content. We asked that the colors be complimentary to the core brand palette (dark blue and bright blue) and convey the themes: collaboration, innovation, and partnership. Though we wanted the art to mix well with the T. Rowe Price brand, we were also sensitive to the fact that we did not want the brand styles to be overpowering as the primary focus of the event is the innovators. The bright colors should be representative of the innovators and their diverse ventures and our core brand colors to be more subtle and foundational—the connecting element between all of the other colors.

A montage of the progression of the artists' artwork.

03.

Iterate as necessary.

We loved the energy of the proposal Jaz created and had only one change—to use the bright blue more sparingly, as that's T. Rowe Price's signature color. We also felt that her design would allow for a lot of variety as it is translated to all the various deliverables.

Execution