Personal Projects and A New Direction

At the beginning of the year I decided to take some time and create a personal project. Personal projects are a great way to jolt your creativity and give yourself a break from client work. They're also a great way to attract more of the work you want to do. Sometimes it can feel like a lot of work to get started and actually carve out time for them, but it is always worth it in the end.

For the last several years I have offered brand & logo design as well as custom stationery design. I was essentially running two businesses within one, and while the process was the same, it was two completely different audiences. I always offered both because I truly love both stationery and branding design and I love working with both types of clients. However, in the back of my mind, I've always thought that it might be a little confusing to the two different types of potential clients that come to my website looking for one or the other services. I also was feeling like I was being spread too thin trying to manage both services under one business.

So at the beginning of the year, I made the decision to separate the two and begin offering only brand design under Lauren Testa Design. I decided to create Faith Street Stationery to be the new home of all of my custom stationery work. However, the catch with this is that I am not currently opening it for business - this is why I am calling it a fictional project. I'm not saying I will never offer stationery design again, but right now I want to shift my focus to only brand design so that I can serve my clients in the best possible way.

I treated this as a real project, the same way I would any other client, and went through my full branding process, because one day I may really bring this to life. I started with a slightly condensed brand strategy and made a mood board and color palette to serve as the starting point for the rest of the brand. I came up with brand buzzwords to guide the design as well.

I wanted Faith Street Stationery to feel elegant and timeless, sophisticated but also approachable. Faith Street Stationery is a boutique stationery brand specializing in custom wedding invitations for engaged couples who desire a sophisticated, timeless, and one of a kind wedding suite, yet are not afraid to break the traditional mold either. You can see the final reveal of what I came up with for my new semi-fictional project here!