Compressing Big Ideas into Little Boxes
When we designed McDaniel College’s website a few years ago, our mandate was first to attract prospective students, while still allowing space for campus news, alumni updates, internship stories, graduate programs and more. We devised a visual and verbal quilt with multiple entry points to communicate an active, multifaceted campus, and to allow constant updating – all within an organized visual hierarchy. We then translated this interactive concept to an ongoing series of printed admissions publications. Brochures are built on a modular grid system flexible enough to accommodate multiple topics, quotes, call-outs, and a variety of photographic styles.
A Brand Driven Strategy
The "McDaniel Plan," an innovative, hands-on, customized learning experience, is heavily promoted by the admissions office to recruit prospective students. A series of mailed admissions incentives – “Expect the Exceptional,” “We Can Change Your Life,” “Choose Your Direction” – consistently reinforce the McDaniel brand while remaining fresh and distinct from one another. Incorporating McDaniel’s green and gold as the primary color scheme along with the flexible modular grid, we designed the viewbook and admissions brochures to reflect the personalized curriculum plan and the varied extra-curricular activities that McDaniel offers.
The grid system provided the perfect format for the “Yield Piece,” sent to admitted students, with brief bios and quotes from recent alums in a wide variety of occupations reflecting the versatility of a McDaniel liberal arts degree.
“Skelton Design collaborated with us to develop a lively design for McDaniel’s website and admissions publications that showcase the stories of our students and faculty in quick, engaging bursts. Throughout the process, the team helped us think through how best to leverage text, images and design to best communicate with our audiences. ‘Thinking out loud’ together via brainstorming phone conversations always reaped great outcomes.”
Kim Asch, Director of Marketing & Special Projects at McDaniel College
Read earlier case studies from this series:
• Admissions Case Study: Lancaster Country Day School
• Admissions Case Study: York College of Pennsylvania
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