Be Well WA

Initiative Branding
Washington State Department of Health

Be Well WA is a new long-term and multi-layered initiative promoting wellness and health equity for all people in Washington state. Anchored by the Washington State Department of Health (DOH), Be Well WA is an innovative collaboration with partners and communities to help empower people throughout Washington with information, resources, and opportunities to improve their individual health and well-being.

Concepting & Brand Development

With Be Well WA, leadership wanted the campaign to have a vibrant, energetic feel that focused on the idea of health for all in Washington state. We took inspiration from other campaigns that encouraged health and well-being from Adidas, Nike, “Let’s Move!” and others. In the initial concepts, I created concepts using the state silhouette, some featuring an apple - both a symbol of health and of Washington state - and a few that felt like wellness or athleisure brands.

After the initial concepts were presented, we made some small revisions to the five that moved forward.

Following the second review, we focused in on concepts featuring apple iconography, including repurposing elements from previous concepts to create two new concepts for the final review.

Once the final review was completed, a favorite concept emerged. The apple icon in the Be Well WA logo uses abstract letterforms of a lowercase ‘b’ in the stem and leaf and a ‘w’ to create the body of the apple. With the logo concept decided on, I tried out some different shapes for the body of the apple and colorways for the red of the apple, stem and seeds.

One of the things that had leadership hesitant with this concept from the beginning was the placement and number of seeds. Once we got that simplified, the buy-in for this concept was nearly unanimous.