HACLA

Refreshing HAcLA’s print design

Timeline

Jan 2024 - May 2024

Designers

Nicholas Swardt
Alexander Zakari

Contributions

Print Design

A report you might actually want to read

Project Goal

When releasing their five-year update, “Snapshot Year 5-10,” The Housing Authority of the City of Los Angeles (HACLA) wanted a brand update along with an overall design polish and elevation. We created a 24-page 9x12 report that aligned with the recent HACLA rebrand. Moving away from previous and more rigid design elements, we took an abstract inspiration that echoed the brand refresh and new logo. We created infographics and original art that better communicated both quantitative and narrative information. We leveraged the agency’s photography in fresh new ways that aligned with color and style guides. We also provided copywriting and copyediting services as needed.

Discovery & Research

finding inspiration

To start, I gathered as much information as I could regarding the organization, its goals, and its vision plan. I also became extremely familiar with the rebranding and existing brand guidelines. We met with and interviewed stakeholders and made sure to get continuous feedback throughout the design process. Being my first real professional print job of this kind, I went on many trips to bookstores, picked up brochures, and looked for print inspiration within and outside of the housing and brochure landscape.

Conceptualization

cover mockups

We approached this similarly to most digital offerings by presenting the client with four very different visual concepts. I went through the copy and outline to choose three pages that would provide a variety of layout options and content types to give the clearest idea of the overall design direction for each approach.

The End Result

pushing boundaries

HACLA’s selected direction was one of my favorites and I was really happy with the outcome. I took a little liberty with the logo and enlarged it to be used on the front and back cover (we did make sure to check in with the branding team).
I then used it abstractly throughout the pages to create a sense of continuity and combined it with as much whitespace as I could to make it feel modern and lightweight. I stayed true to the photography (friendly, personal, realistic, and local avoiding clip art, and iconography) guidelines as well as staying within the Gotham font family (a great choice and fun to work with).