Overview
While art directing several category pages for The Home Depot, I repeatedly encountered inconsistent and outdated design treatments. The existing brand standards lived in a printed style guide that became outdated almost as soon as it was produced, leaving individual teams working from different versions of the rules.
I identified the need for a centralized digital resource, pitched the idea to our Creative Director, gained buy-in, and helped lead the development of an interactive style guide that could evolve alongside the brand.
Challenge
The project required more than converting a printed document to digital. We needed to consolidate current standards, resolve inconsistencies, account for stakeholder needs, and create a resource that could be easily updated as new digital use cases emerged.
Approach
Working closely with the Creative Director, stakeholders, and a developer, we explored several approaches before creating a custom microsite that gave us control over the content, navigation, and interactions.
I created the visual examples and formalized specifications for elements including typography, color, logos, iconography, navigation tiles, patterns, and hero treatments.
A key focus was eliminating recurring inconsistencies rather than simply documenting them. I established specifications for hero dimensions, text padding, and shadow treatments. As our proprietary Homervetica typeface enabled the transition to live web text, I provided specifications that allowed many of these rules to be incorporated directly into the CMS.
Outcome
The interactive guide became a living design system shared across the enterprise and with our Canadian and Mexican counterparts. Our proprietary typefaces were embedded directly into the experience, making the standards immediately usable by teams.
Following launch, I participated in category refresh reviews across the site to ensure brand consistency and identify new use cases that needed to be incorporated into the guide.
For me, the project's greatest success was recognizing an organizational problem, articulating a solution, earning stakeholder support, and helping turn that idea into a system that improved how the broader team managed the brand.
