Portfolio by Heather Shaw
Project 1 of 11
Maryland Institute College of Art
www.mica.edu
It wasn't hard to see what differentiated MICA from the average art college. The mix of modern and classic architecture on campus (I'm told the visual texture of which was Abbott Miller's inspiration for MICA's bold, new logo), an atmosphere and facilities created for maximum creative freedom, the annual mustache party, the list goes on.
But what stood out to me the most was the artwork. The massive amount of talent at this school was something I thought other schools could not easily compete with. So I started with a big piece of student artwork and designed the concept around that. Then, figuring the more showcased art the better, I conceptualized a bit of functionality that allowed visitors to navigate through four pieces via thumbnails at the top right. When a new piece is selected, not only does the large image change, but the color scheme of the home page and the entire site changes to match it. With the help of developers Dan Mall, Mark Huot, Jenn Lukas, and the internal development team at MICA, the site came to fruition with every visual and functional detail intact. And thanks to Jason Santa Maria, the wealth of sub-level pages were individually designed with just as much thought and care as the original concept.
