The creative brief for Washington State University’s admissions website called for an Instagram inspired aesthetic, a greater use of student voices, and a sense of surprise, of flourishes waiting to be discovered when browsing the site. Of course, in addition to these superficial niceties, the site needed to accomplish the basics first: consistent messaging and primary actions (inquire, visit, apply) always at the ready. As for design, we decided on a “long-page” style and to make it WSU’s first responsive site. Additional information and easter eggs are discovered through a series of flipping and growing cards sprinkled throughout the site. The consistency in design on the front end conceals a dizzying array of piecemeal, legacy apps on the backend that had to be strong-armed into functioning as one. The result is a site that, since its inception, has served to consistently recruit some of WSU’s largest freshmen classes.
