Saving a Dying Language

(how I think about the purpose of design) thinkcherokee.com

My client, JW Webster, is an indigenous language instructor on a noble quest to save the Cherokee language. I was grateful for the opportunity to honor the trust he placed in me to design and develop his website, thinkcherokee.com.

I decided to think about the design without reference to the wonderful resources provided by my client or the scores of Cherokee resources online. I thought about the design using only the humble tools of my imagination.

It quickly became apparent what kind of design wouldn’t work for this project. It became clear that this couldn’t be one of my standard websites, designed for high conversions. This couldn’t be commercial. It had to be remarkable. It had to be vibrant and full of life. The design had to be, in itself, a promise of the Cherokee's cultural revival.

Now it was time to look at some of JW's resources, Cherokee museums, and similar Cherokee-themed websites.

True challenges soon emerged. My heart wanted a warm red website, while my brain knew that creating a red-themed website would be a design challenge. Cherokee people use a lot of colors to express themselves. Similarly themed websites have tried to present this in their designs, but this approach made all those designs a little out of touch. They broke the fragile rules of design and color theory…

Black is a color of death for Cherokee people. It was clear that there is no place for death on a website devoted to saving a dying language. In one of our sessions, the client educated me about the color blue in Cherokee's tradition. Blue is the color of defeat.

I stayed within my red pastel color palette. I managed to honor the vivid Cherokee costumes by building a colorful sphere of red-orange, yellow, green, and brown. Because the Sun is the central symbol of Cherokee's spiritual life, I made sure to have one warm Sun rising above the core website design.

I also wanted to add a note of mystery. Part of learning a language is unlocking its secrets. That's why I intentionally left the Cherokee phrase at the center top of the website.

I have also avoided placing a CTA button at the top of the website. I intentionally made it hard for the CTA button to impact the first impression. I didn't want the CTA button to spoil a fantastic first impression.

The CTA button is a commitment. The first step to the journey you are about to make. I asked JW to get me a phrase that looks puzzling and that can be translated with a positive "Yes" in English. He delivered something unique.

Cherokee elements embedded at the bottom part of the page helped create an emotional story. I was thinking about Cherokee descendants that will be seeing this website, and I want them to feel familiar with it and to feel at home.

I wanted them to feel real connections, like with breadbasket pattern. My client, JW, felt a special connection with the breadbasket pattern, so I replicated the pattern in Illustrator and applied it as a repeating background to a few sections.

Working on this design was my first Cherokee journey. I learned about Cherokee tradition, culture, and beliefs. As a designer I was surprised by the tricky nature of color theory. Our design definitions, concepts and applications originate from a very specific, personalized and private prism through which we look at the world. These private prisms only work in specific contexts, at specific times. While vastly different, nobody's view is wrong. It's incumbent upon good design to bridge the gap between divergent viewpoints. Designing this website was my small gift to a greater cause.

Check the final work at thinkcherokee.com.

'til we meet again. (Denadagohvyu)