A scalable visual identity system for Harappa — translating its Thrive Skills framework into a clear, flexible brand language across learning content, enterprise products, and a growing ecosystem of digital and print assets.
Brand identity cover — Harappa's visual system anchored in "Thrive for Life." The yellow-dominant palette, white wordmark, and vertical colour-coded school strips establish a bold, immediately recognisable identity for an enterprise learning institution.
Creative Playbook cover — the visual knowledge-sharing document that became the internal standard for all design and content teams operating within the Harappa brand ecosystem.
Full system overview — a single reference sheet mapping every element of the identity: logo usage, colour palette, typography, texture hierarchy, imagery logic, and digital application examples.
Logo placement system — clear space rules using the bracket [H] mark as a guide, minimum and maximum size specs, and do/don't grids across all background contexts. Covers usage on white, grey, yellow, and every vertical colour.
Brand colour system — Haldi Yellow, Charcoal Grey, and Shell White with defined proportion ratios (20% grey · 40% yellow · 40% white). The six named colours are Haldi Yellow, Gulal Pink, Narangi Orange, Tulsi Green, Jodhpuri Blue, and Shell White.
Business vertical colour schematics — Gulal Pink (Student+College), Narangi Orange (Entry Level), Tulsi Green (Mid Level), Jodhpuri Blue (Advance Level). Each vertical carries its accent colour at a defined ratio within the brand base.
Typography system — Jost across all platforms, in five weight combinations (Bold + Medium, Bold + Medium Italic, Medium + Medium Italic, Bold + Regular, Medium + Regular). A strict even-number font size rule and +4pt leading formula ensure visual consistency at every scale.
Type on background rules — white on yellow requires 50px+ (or caps if under 50px, Extra Bold only); grey on yellow is limited to Regular/Medium weights. These rules prevent legibility failures across the high-volume content production the system was built to support.
Grayscale imagery system — all objects and people are rendered in greyscale at a defined tonal range (the Greyscale Meter). Yellow becomes the only colour that pops, directing attention and creating hierarchy with minimal visual noise.
People prop logic — people are the only assets used in full colour (with yellow clothing purposefully chosen at shoot). Relative objects (hourglasses, notepads, clocks) are selectively coloured to add pop without competing for visual weight.
Creative collage system in application — greyscale figures at surreal scale with yellow geometric shapes as structural anchors. The open-mind and stopwatch compositions illustrate how abstract Thrive Skills concepts (curiosity, urgency) are made immediately legible through imagery.
Scale contrast and surrealism — people miniaturised onto fists and polaroid circles. Two distinct compositional frameworks within one visual system, both immediately recognisable as Harappa without a logo present.
Career trajectory visualisation — the learner journey from college (pink) through entry (orange), mid (green), advance (blue), to senior brand level (yellow). The vertical colour system maps directly onto a rising bar chart, making progression legible at a glance.
Website application — the identity system operating across a digital platform interface, demonstrating consistency across the complete digital ecosystem including course cards, navigation, and content hierarchy.
Social media application — Instagram feed showing the brand language adapted for social content: course cards, testimonials, and engagement posts all maintaining visual consistency within the established yellow-anchored system.
Harappa Learner Kits — the identity extended into physical brand touchpoints. Notebooks, mugs, coasters, bookmarks, and bag all carry the [H] mark and yellow palette consistently. The identity works as well in object form as it does on screen.
Kit Set A (Affordable) — multi-colour notebook spines (blue, green, orange) against a yellow base. The vertical colour system translates into physical form: each spine colour signals a different learning level within the same brand family.
Kit Set B (Premium — WLP) — tote bag, embossed envelope, and structured booklet. The premium tier uses material and finish elevation (embossing, woven canvas) while remaining entirely within the yellow-anchored identity system.
Full-screen creative application — yellow retouched through a torn-paper texture object, with greyscale figure and prop composited inside. Shows the system working at maximum colour saturation: bold, textured, and immediately on-brand.
Digital application — the identity system at screen scale, showing the brand language operating across a digital platform interface. Designed from the outset to hold equally across enterprise decks, social content, physical collateral, and digital products.
The system had to communicate rigour and warmth simultaneously — authoritative enough for enterprise, human enough for learners.
— Design brief, EdTech Visual Identity System, Harappa · upGrad Enterprise, 2021
Reviewing Harappa's existing visual outputs across learning content, enterprise assets, and communications — identifying inconsistencies, understanding the Thrive Skills framework in depth, and establishing a clear conceptual direction for the identity system. Defining what the brand needed to feel like before designing what it needed to look like.
Building the core visual system — colour palette structured around the Thrive Skills taxonomy, typography hierarchy for digital and print contexts, and the grid and layout principles that would govern composition across formats. Designing each element to work independently and cohesively within the system as a whole.
Developing the image language — the rules governing how photography, illustration, texture, and mixed-media elements were combined to represent abstract skills with clarity. This visual metaphor framework became the conceptual foundation for the mixed-media collage asset library that would extend the system into scalable content production.
Documenting the full system for use by internal design and content teams across Harappa and upGrad Enterprise — usage guidelines, do/don't examples, component specifications, and application principles across every major format. Ensuring the identity could be applied consistently by teams who hadn't been part of its creation.
Leading a full visual identity end-to-end — from conceptual direction through colour, typography, image language, layout, and documented guidelines — is a different scope from individual campaign or asset work. This project demonstrates the ability to design a system that enables others, not just a deliverable that stands alone.
The Thrive Skills framework deals in ideas — critical thinking, communication, collaboration — that resist straightforward visual representation. Designing a brand language that makes these concepts feel concrete, recognisable, and differentiated is a genuinely complex creative problem, and one that recurs constantly in EdTech, consultancy, and professional services contexts.
At ~80–90 hours, this was a substantive engagement requiring the system to be designed for longevity — not just for the immediate output, but for the teams who would use it for years after handoff. Designing identity systems that hold up under real-world production pressure, across multiple teams and formats, is where brand design expertise becomes genuinely valuable.
Open to senior in-house roles, design consultancy partnerships, and long-term freelance or retainer engagements — particularly within Europe.