Role
Creative Director
Brand Designer
Presentation Designer
Team
Kath Reyes / President
Peter Soutullo / Mentorship Director
Christy Digiandomenico / Comms Director
Casey Rivera / Social Media + Comms
Suzy Johnson / Awards + Merch Curation
Em Schaefer / Awards Design
Timeline
6 Months
Overview
This year, I led creative direction & brand design for AIGA Orlando’s annual Mentorship Program + SPOT Showcase. This program is a big deal for design students in Orlando’s colleges & universities, so I aimed to elevate the excitement & opportunity that this program holds for many young designers with this year's branding.
Context
A highly anticipated annual program for young creatives in Orlando
The Mentorship Program and its closing event, SPOT Showcase, are AIGA Orlando’s most attended + highly anticipated events every year.
In previous years: The Mentorship Program used similar-looking graphics to convey all information related to it on AIGA Orlando’s social media.
On some years: SPOT Showcase campaign posts occasionally had inconsistent branding from the initial Mentorship Program posts (above both from 2025).
Opportunity
Elevate AIGA Orlando's Mentorship Program with a fun, cohesive brand that reflects the opportunity it holds for many emerging designers each year.
2026 Mentorship Program Stats
21
Mentors
19
Mentees
3
Orlando-Area Colleges Served
40+
SPOT Showcase Attendees
Brand Showcase
Approach
AIGA Orlando's Mentorship Program + SPOT Showcase already had logos, but everything else needed to be defined. The starting point was recalling how I saw the Mentorship Program when I was studying graphic design at UCF. From there, I built up the branding and creative direction.
01
Capturing that feeling
Based on my own experience as a mentee when I was a fresh grad, I aimed to capture the sense of opportunity and excitement that the Mentorship Program holds for many Orlando-area design students. I created a mind map of words that described how I personally felt about the program when I was a design student.
02
Doodles! Lots and lots of doodles.
I used playful doodles to invoke the free-spirited nature many young designers have while they are in school. Many reference design-related tools (pencils, X-Acto knives) while others reference more niche design things (“The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog” placeholder text).
The doodles also add a human touch to the branding, which is especially important to communicate to emerging designers in the age of AI (basically: “you are not replaceable!”).
03
Best Practices Guide
To help my fellow board members apply the branding when creating print collateral, merch, and awards, I created a best practices slide deck and provided an Illustrator file with different variations of branding assets.
Brand Specs
AIGA Orlando's Mentorship Program already had a logo, but everything else needed to be defined each year. This year, I led creative direction & brand design for AIGA Orlando’s annual Mentorship Program + SPOT Showcase. This program is a big deal for design students in Orlando’s colleges & universities, so I aimed to elevate the excitement & opportunity that this program holds for many young designers with this year's branding.
Connect CMS Image fields (Image 1–10)
Connect CMS Image fields (Image 1–10)
Learnings
Provide all brand assets for use from the start
Being my first big project as AIGA Orlando's Creative Director, some best practices were defined as I went. This led to earlier graphics looking "samey" across print collateral for some Mentorship Program events. I realized how important it is to provide all brand assets from the get-go to ensure the branding is being used as intended.
A full circle moment!
Just 2 years before (when I was about to graduate UCF's design program), I was a mentee in the Mentorship Program myself and even won Best of Show (SPOT Showcase Award) for my passion project, New Perspective. Now being AIGA Orlando's Creative Director, it's surreal to be leading the creative direction for the same program that helped me hone my design craft & strategic thinking fresh out of college.
Me as a mentee in 2024…
… and me as AIGA Orlando's Creative Director in 2026!