I’m so excited to be writing today about the launch of my personal brand Vanessa Bucceri Creative. When designers say it’s hard to design for themselves, I’d have to agree wholeheartedly!
While my website and business officially went public on May 31st, 2018, the development of this brand started about a year ago.
I was working full time at my corporate gig when I decided to enroll at Skillcrush, the online coding school. I started their Visual Designer blueprint in hopes I could learn enough to leave my full-time job and do freelance work from home.
My first assignment was creating a design for my portfolio style website! In the course, I developed the brand foundations that you see here today with lots of refinements along the way!
Let’s take a look at how this project evolved over the past year.
The Humble Beginnings of Vanessa Bucceri Creative
The initial website design has one big thing in common with today’s version. The colour palette hasn’t changed since the initial selections back in the spring of 2017.
Pink & orange can be a difficult grouping and I went through several combinations before getting it just right – not too bright but not too muted either.
It was important to me to have some bold colours paired with softer hues. Softer choices are key as they often become the most used colours in your palette. The bolder choices make great statement picks but should be used sparingly for maximum emphasis.
You may also notice here, I wasn’t 100% certain on what my offerings would be as a designer. I was all over the map looking at styled stock photography, web design and even data visualizations.
Over time, as I became more clear about my services and my target audience, my design changed as I niched my business offerings.
Phase Two of Vanessa Bucceri Creative
After completing the Skillcrush Visual Design blueprint, I decided I wanted to be able to code my own work. So, I started the Front-End Developer blueprint and got lots of practice writing HTML, CSS & JavaScript.
The main project from this blueprint was once again a portfolio website. However, instead of coding from my original design I coded a template provided through the course and updated it with my brand details. You can see part of the final one-page website below.
In this iteration, you may notice the first usage of my VB logo which I still use today.
Also, I’ve now landed on my main font pairings of Playfair Display for the headers matched with Raleway for subheadings and paragraph text.
This version of the design was a little more playful than the final product with a colourful main image, coloured header text and the cute icons courtesy of Flaticon.
Once again in this web design, my services have changed from all things design to a mix of design & web development. The fun and colourful branding fit with the offerings and target market I had in mind when coding out this website.
However, as I tried to develop my coding skills, I realized it would take some time before I would be able to code the type of websites I wanted to build.
So, for a third time, my business plan changed. Along with a change in services came a change in target customer and therefore a final re-working of the personal brand for Vanessa Bucceri Creative!
The Brand Reveal for Vanessa Bucceri Creative
She’s elegant, classy and joyful. She celebrates the details and nuances of nature and draws inspiration from her cosmopolitan surroundings.
She’s humble and brave, serene and soft, feminine and creative. She prefers sweet over salty any day. City breaks are just as great as sun escapes.
Meet Vanessa Bucceri Creative!
The Brand Style Guide
- I kept the colour palette from the original brand design.
- Font selections are from the redesign in August of 2017.
- The main VB logo also remains from the redesign.
- The logo suite was expanded with the launch to include lettermark variations and a wordmark for the website header.
The Mood Boards
- The visual look and feel of the brand was refined with imagery.
- I brought back a script font into the design to add some feminine detail.
The Home Page Website Design
If you’re on this website, chances are you’ve seen the home page but here it is again. You can see how we’ve tied together all the branding details to pull together the final website.
Built on the Showit platform, I loved how easy it was to make something completely custom that fit my brand choices perfectly.
Behind the blog
I’m Vanessa. The Founder & Creative Director of Vanessa Bucceri Creative.
We work with ambitious service professionals who are ready to uplevel their brand identity so they can flourish in their businesses. We show style-minded business owners just like you how to connect with your audience through artful branding & web design - all while truly listening to your vision and intuitively bringing it to life.
More About VBC
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