Education
Political content had a look. Tired, tribal, combative — a visual language so entrenched it had become invisible. Redeeming Babel's new program wasn't just entering that space, it was trying to redefine it. With a skeptical audience and a message that ran counter to main players in the category, The After Party needed a brand bold enough to carry its new message and humble enough to be believed.
A project of Good Faith (formerly Redeeming Babel), The After Party is an online curriculum forming Christians to engage more faithfully in political life—not around the "what" of parties and policies, but the "how" of justice, humility, and mercy. The target audience was deeply complex: Christians across the political spectrum, carrying strong convictions, fatigue, and skepticism. Entering into a tense and mistrustful landscape, The team knew their brand had to earn trust if it wanted to gain traction.
The Good Faith team came to me in the early stages of the project. The core offering, an online learning platform, was showing positive responses in initial test groups, and the team had its sights set on a nationwide reach. They understood the complexities of Christian political programming in a moment of deep division in America—and they knew their approach couldn't be generic. It had to embody the very values they were teaching: humility, unity, and deference to others.
We focused first on a deep collaboration to pinpoint the audience's backgrounds, needs, cultural context, and the program's core ethos. The team already came in with a strong understanding of their audience and the cultural landscape. After all, these were people and problems they felt personally. This personal proximity lent powerful emotive depth and nuance to our explorations. It also necessitated careful facilitation and synthesis as the external brand and creative partner—creating space for strong and diverse convictions, while also pushing back where necessary.
That balancing act extended into the creative work itself. Firm convictions about what the brand should and shouldn't do were understandable given the stakes. There was one firm directive: no donkeys, no elephants. But having developed a clear picture of the program's ethos and a thorough understanding of its audience, I could see a solution that others closer to the program could not. The final logo brought the elephant and donkey front and center, but importantly, recontextualized them under a Christian understanding—a move that spoke powerfully to the exact transformation the program advocates for.
With heads bent beneath a star, evoking the Christian Nativity scene, an olive branch denoting peace, and the posture of humility of two symbols now so evocative of division, the logo becomes a visual symbol for humility and hope.
The very symbols the team feared became the most theologically resonant and authentic solution, one that brought new language into a generic category. Consonant with the ethos and mission of the program, it powerfully expressed the brand's core identity as a new, unexpected path forward.
Knowing the team's bold nationwide vision, I included an alternate logomark for greater flexibility across various formats, and with the knowledge that this mark could carry the brand even further as the brand reputation grew. This phased and future-forward approach meant the brand was equipped for multiple growth-stages.
Despite the initial non-negotiables at project outset, the internal team's overwhelmingly positive response at the first brand unveiling was the early signal that the work had landed. Participant reactions confirmed it—and continued to, year after year.
The collaborative partnership grew as the program grew, building out a full suite of marketing materials: social media templates, landing page design, email newsletter templates, live event materials, and more. Further, the brand guidelines document continued to guide a small and changing team to ensure a consistent brand presence through the years.
Six years later, the brand continues to serve The After Party well, maintaining positive responses from both the internal team and program participants alike. With a nationwide reach of over 250,000, The After Party brand inspires a culture of unity in areas of contention and skepticism.
Uncharted brand territory
No shared visual language existed for faith-based civic engagement — only the tired, divisive imagery of political content. TAP was a new player tasked with creating a new brand language.
A skeptical audience
A nuanced audience with deeply held convictions, political fatigue, and high skepticism meant a misstep in tone could scare away already shaky prospects. This was a high stakes brand entry with no margin for error.
Every asset built from scratch
No framework for an independent team to maintain a consistent brand presence as the program scaled.
No system, slow momentum
No consistent infrastructure for bringing content to audiences — slowing down a remote team at every turn.
A brand that earns trust without the need for words
The visual identity communicates humility, approachability, and hope at a glance — positioning The After Party as a genuinely different kind of voice in a crowded, contentious space.
Audience that felt seen
Overwhelming positive response to the visual brand from participants at the first brand unveiling. Today, course participants span the full political spectrum — 44% conservative, 26% moderate, 29% liberal. In one of the most polarized moments in American history, the brand speaks to all of them.
Brand ready to scale, no designer needed
A comprehensive brand guidelines document keeping a small, changing team consistent across years of content, campaigns, and external partnerships.
Press go
A multichannel marketing suite — social templates, email layouts, event materials, and landing page designs — ready to deploy.
Capabilities
Curtis Chang, Founder & Executive Director
250k+
Nationwide audience reach, spanning all 50 states
Record high
Single-day visits at peak
Over the three years following brand launch, the results were clear: a 250k and growing nationwide audience, a packed live event in Washington D.C., a growing internal team as people heard of and felt drawn to the mission and brand, and numerous positive personal experiences of program participants nationwide. Six years post-launch, the brand is running strong, and has grown into their secondary logomark that I provided, evidencing the spread of their core message and values, and a new stage of brand maturity.
Brand trust isn't a design deliverable. It's a research outcome.
With an audience already burnt out and skeptical of anything with political branding, nailing the right tone was essential, both verbally and visually. We knew that to get this wrong would be to squander initial touchpoints with new viewers, deepening the divide the program sought to heal. We crafted a visual identity that supported the program's verbal identity--offering an olive branch on first view and going to the heart of the hopes and desires of their target groups at the first glance.
A brand is an infrastructure investment
The logo is a single visible output but the real brand vehicle is the system — guidelines, templates, frameworks that allow scaled growth. The documentation and comprehensive brand kit and templates empowered a small and changing team to upkeep the brand and expand it nationwide. Six years later, that investment is still paying off.
A brand is a relationship investment
Not only did the comprehensive brand allow the team to operate at a higher degree of internal efficiency, having a carefully constructed and consistent brand meant that every brand piece and brand moment--live events, online courses, digital downloads, newsletters--furthered their brand equity and the relationship with their audience. From entering into the political education space as a new player, the brand successfully become a statement-maker, building equity and investment from scratch. The brand and brand marks now come with a building legacy that new players will have to measure themselves against.
Build your brand like you build your programs
Strong nonprofit programs aren't built on assumptions, they're built on the validated contexts, needs, and experiences of the people they serve. Similarly, a brand that ignores the listening phase is a brand that speaks past its audience. The After Party's visual identity earned trust because the strategy behind it was built the same way the program was: from the inside out.
Your program speaks to your audience. Does your brand?
