A brand kit for one local business

The situation

A shop near you has a hand-painted sign, a WhatsApp display picture made in a phone app, and a poster its nephew made with six fonts. Give it three pieces that belong together — a social post, a poster and a business card — built on the fundamentals: alignment, three colours, one font family, a hierarchy a stranger reads in two seconds, and files exported the way a printer and a phone each need them.

What you'll be able to show

• Diagnose the six faults in a weak design and avoid them in your own
• Hold a layout to two alignment lines and a consistent margin
• Build a palette of three from a photograph and a type system of one family, three sizes, two weights
• Export correctly for print and for screen

What you need

• Canva, Figma, or any tool you already use
• One real business's name, phone and a photograph of it or its product
• A phone, to check the work outdoors

Tasks

1. 1Diagnose the current design
   Take the business's existing poster or post. Draw straight lines down every left edge you can find and count them. List which of the six faults from lesson 1 appear.
   A correct result: A count of alignment lines and a list of faults present.
2. 2Palette from a photograph
   From a photograph of the business or its product, pull three colours — dominant, accent, neutral — and record their hex codes. Check the accent on white and on the dominant colour for contrast.
   A correct result: Three hex codes and a note on which pairs are readable.
3. 3The type system
   Choose one font family. Define exactly three sizes and two weights, and write down where each is used (headline, body, small print).
   A correct result: A one-line spec: family, three sizes, two weights, their jobs.
4. 4The social post
   Design one square post with one message. Use no more than two alignment lines, the three colours, and the type system. Write the three hierarchy levels before you start, then show the post to somebody for two seconds and ask what they read first.
   A correct result: The post, the written hierarchy, and the two-second test result — adjusted until level one wins.
5. 5The poster and the card
   Design an A4 poster and a business card for the same business, using the same palette and type system, so the three pieces are obviously one brand.
   A correct result: Three pieces side by side that a stranger would say belong together.
6. 6Export three ways
   Export the poster as a print-ready PDF at 300 dpi with bleed, the post as a web JPG under 500 KB, and the logo or card element as a PNG with a transparent background. Open each and check it.
   A correct result: Three files with the right format, size and transparency.
7. 7Check it in the world
   Open the post on a phone outdoors in daylight. Print the poster (or view it at arm's length on a large screen). Write down what you changed after seeing it in each place.
   A correct result: Two notes: what changed after the phone check, what changed after the print check.

What to hand in

The three pieces, the three exported files, the palette and type spec, the fault diagnosis, and the two field-check notes.

How it is marked