by Lucas Leo Catalano
My graduating project from Instituto Europeo di Design‘s (IED) Master of Visual Communication I completed a design application to Giardino Orto Botanico di Roma, part of the Università di Sapienza‘s biology department. The botanical garden is a twelve hectare property that was once the gardens of the Vatican.Pope Alexander VII later in 1660 entrusted the university of Rome with the gardens, who developed the garden’s use into an important botanical research and conservation facility whilst being open to the public as museum. The scope of the project was to shepherd the visual communication of the museum out of the current One Size Fits All design of Università di Sapienza, Roma. The objective was to raise the value of the user experience, reduce communication upkeep, and increase ticket sales without shifting the values of the institution (e.g. turn the gardens into a place to host weddings). Given that there were no specified limits I proposed as much as a holistic visual communication design possible, containing a; brand and identity redesign, wayfinding and signage system, and advertising campaign.
