Washington Trails Association Rebrand

Project Overview

Washington Trails Association is a conservation organization that provides hikers a way to explore the outdoors no matter who they are or where they visit from. WTA’s trails app, hiking guide, and trip reports make hiking accessible and easy. WTA provides a strong sense of community and a safe place to belong.

However, WTA’s current brand is dated. The objective of the rebrand is to help Washington Trails Association have a more youthful inclusive feel that will appeal to a new younger generation to get them into the outdoors.

Roles and Skills

My primary role: UI designer, Brand designer
Branding
Visual Design
UI Design (Web & App)

Collaborators

Bridget ShewGraphic designer, Brand designer

Deliverables

Website/Landing Page
WTA App
Social Media
A-frames
Gears

Tools

Adobe Illustrator
Adobe Photoshop
Adobe Indesign
Figma
Miro
Google Slides
Zoom

Problem/Challenge

Research

Demographics

The audience believes that hiking is a fun and exciting activity, so they want to make sure that the hiking trail they are going on will be memorable. The primary audience for Washington Trails Association would be hikers living in the Greater Seattle area. For the secondary audience, they could be visitors from outside of the state that wants to hike trails here in WA.

WTA offers a guide to hikers, from beginners to experts, about all the incredible hiking trails around the state. The company also offers volunteer programs that help keep trails accessible/walkable. By donating, volunteering, or taking action in preserving lands and trails, Washington Trails Association can continue to do its mission.

Below, we created personas representing our audience and identifying the needs that we would want to solve in this rebrand.

Competitive Analysis

Another part of our research is to look up other organizations similar to Washington Trails Association and observe their business models. I researched three organizations across the country to see what they did well and what opportunities WTA will gain from this analysis. The top three organizations I found were AllTrails, Hiking Project, and American Hiking Society.

Ideation

Tonal Territories

To start our rebrand, Bridget and I brainstormed words or phrases that would best describe the experience of the Washington Trails Association guide. We did an online whiteboard session using Miro to think of different words to describe WTA. After our session, we had adventurous, inclusive, and environmentally aware as our tonal territories.

Tonal territories: environmentally-aware

Concept Board

Once we've established our tonal territories, we created our concept board as our main inspiration for the project. To check if our deliverables were "on brand," we always referred to the concept board with the colors, illustrations, type, photography, and the overall look and feel.

However, creating the concept board was the most challenging part of the whole project. Bridget and I had two different ideas on how we wanted our concept board to look based on our tonal territories. Having our conversations mainly on Slack built miscommunications and frustrations between us. So we addressed the situation by blocking a specific time when we were both free to do a Zoom call.

After discussing our conflicting ideas, we found a way to combine them to create our current concept board (see below). One of the critical visuals I made was an illustration style we call "energy lines." These lines are drawn on people or nature to give off the feelings of liveliness and curiosity when exploring the outdoors.

Sample illustrations of energy lines:

Mountains with a sun

Outdoor backpack

Person with a beanie

Sun with a cloud

View Full Brand Book Here

Prototyping

Digital Deliverables - Website

After establishing a concept board, I started rebranding Washington Trails Association's digital products: the website, the app, and social media accounts such as Instagram. In our concept board, the photography styles that we want to incorporate into the new brand are bright, open, boundless, and natural. These images will give the audience the feeling of adventure awaiting them and inspire them to seek the outdoors.

The first digital product I rebranded was the website. I selected a hero image that shows a hiker looking into the mountains and the horizon to invite the audience about what it's like being a part of WTA. Some images also contain energy line illustrations for more emphasis on the adventurous aspect of the brand. Below are comparisons of the current and rebranded website and a video of the entire homepage.

WTA Current Website

WTA Rebranded Website

Digital Deliverables - App

Washington Trails Association's current mobile app is called Trailblazer, where users can browse through thousands of trails and read trip reports from other hikers. The current user interface, however, is not as user-friendly. With the rebrand, I focused on balancing visual elements and accessibility so that users can use the app more efficiently and intuitively.

WTA Current App

WTA Rebranded App

Basic Design System for Accessibility

Summary

Conclusion

Our rebrand of Washington Trails Association focuses on bringing in a younger audience to be a part of the organization's mission of conserving trails, building communities, and providing access to the outdoors for everyone. We want to appeal to them and make their digital experience worthwhile by redesigning WTA's digital products based on our three tonal territories: adventurous, inclusive, and environmentally aware.

Reflection

During the middle of the quarter, there was a moment when we were struggling to make our concept board cohesive and consistent across our deliverables. We also had different visions of how we wanted our rebrand to look or feel. We were able to have a more solid concept after communicating and meeting instead of only messaging through Slack. When we combined the energy lines with bright, open photography is when we found our “a-ha” moment.

As far as the website and the mobile app, starting with the design system and making the assets were relatively quick; however, the more I designed the user interface to be accessible, the more changes were made. I made sure that colors had high contrast and that typefaces were readable. When we finally were able to have a solid vision of our concept board, it became a lot easier for me to incorporate the elements into our deliverables.