CONTEXT TO THE PROBLEM:
Freak Salon is a beauty salon catering specifically to the queer and the transgender communities in India. It is named after the most common word used to ridicule transgenders- 'FREAK'. Despite gender-fluid and modern times, people from the queer and the transgender community face hostility and social friction in most spaces, including salons. Most salons do not allow entry to transgenders fearing the discomfort their presence will cause to other customers. Similarly, fearing the hostile reactions of people, transgenders too avoid walking into beauty parlours. As a result, 'Freak Salon' was failing as a venture.
This project was aimed at designing an empathetic digital experience to revive Freak Salon as an app service, along with re-designing the brand identity and the visual guidelines celebrating the identity of transgenders.
THE PROBLEM:
From the recorded incident above and the research chart below, we can derive how despite improvement in their economic affordability over the years, both physical salons as well as private appointments remain out of reach for the transgender and the queer community in India.
Logo development:
IDENTITY DESIGN AND BRANDING:
Instead of using new inspiration and new colour research which the audience doesn't currently relate to, the existing colours of the 'Pride Month' which celebrate the identity of transgenders and the queer community were used as inspiration to design the identity, branding and visual guidelines.
Colour palette:
Logo development:
FONT SELECTION (DO FONTS HAVE A GENDER TOO?):
IMAGE TREATMENT AND FILTERS:
USER EXPERIENCE DESIGN:
USER INTERFACE DESIGN:
SEQUENCE OF INTERFACES (FULL PROCESS):
CLICKABLE PROTOTYPE:
To interact with the clickable prototype, Click this link: https://xd.adobe.com/view/b07f04fc-a4a0-445b-aba5-a9cc7ebb9069-e52c/?fullscreen