Senior Design Project: WNBA Team Branding
My senior design project consisted of designing the branding and campaign elements for a hypothetical Oakland based WNBA team. Oakland is a city with a rich history of striving for societal progress. The WNBA has a similar history and has been at the forefront of fighting for values such as equal representation when it comes to major sports leagues. Because of this, bringing a WNBA team to Oakland would be a mutually beneficial marriage as it would not only bring a new market into the mix for the WNBA, but additionally this could be a way to demonstrate diverse representation and leadership to the next generation of young women in the Bay Area.
Problem
The Bay Area has many male professional sports teams with athletes serving as role models for boys, but there are no female professional sports teams that can offer role models and representation for girls.
Purpose
The mission is to design a campaign for an Oakland based WNBA team that connects with the community and focuses on female representation.
Concepts
Once a name was decided upon, the main logo for the Golden State Guardians began its development. The image below shows the driving concepts that influenced the final design. Key factors are the inclusion of imagery of the city of Oakland such as the port and skyline as well as references to the name "Guardians", and of course, the fact that this logo would be that of a professional Basketball team.
Prototype
The logo below was the prototype used during the design project before its eventual update. The color scheme is a direct nod to this hypothetical WNBA team's local NBA counterpart across the Bay Bridge, the Golden State Warriors. The decision to use similar colors as the Warriors was based on market consistency. Current WNBA teams such as the Los Angeles Sparks and Minnesota Lynx use similar colors and brand designs as their local NBA counterparts as well. Elements in the logo include Oakland's skyline, a sunset to reference the port of Oakland, and a basketball pattern all framed within a shield. The font used is Bahnschrift Bold. It was selected for its consistently weighted, sans serif characters which are bold but not distracting.
Final Logo
The final logo design for the Golden State Guardians features some updates such as reflective glare and a guardian holding the shield, ready to defend her city. Inspiration for the guardian character comes from Wonder Woman and ancient spartan helmets. The decision to include the guardian comes from the lack of female imagery in the previous iterations.
Clear Space & Implementation Notes
Billboard Design & Mockup
This billboard splits its background with imagery of a crowd celebrating a championship in Oakland and of team owner and former WNBA player, Alana Beard. In October of 2021, Alana Beard was announced as the lead of an ownership group that is actually trying to bring a WNBA team to the Bay Area. The heading says, “Oakland, we’re #GoldenTogether” which incorporates the team’s slogan that will be used throughout this campaign while also directly speaking to the home city of this hypothetical franchise. The WNBA logo and the Golden State Guardians logo is front and center in order to establish the purpose of the billboard.
Online Advertisement Design & Mockup
The advertisement for this campaign takes the format of a tweet. The ad graphic itself is similar to the billboard. Key difference is that since tweets do not need to be read as fast as billboards do, the slogan is moved into the text portion of the tweet. Additionally, the graphic would link directly to the campaign’s website.
Home & Away Jerseys
The white home jersey for the Golden State Guardians implements a reduced version of the team’s logo that does not have reflective glare or the guardian behind the shield. As well, the basketball pattern from the original logo is replaced with jersey numbering. The black away jersey serves as a love letter to the community as it introduces a subtle graphic that is meant to pay homage to the port of Oakland.
Project Poster
The poster below was created for the presentation of my senior design project at San Francisco State University. This poster encapsulates the key elements of this project and offers additional insight regarding the purpose and inspirations behind these designs.
