Web. Orange you glad we’re doing a refresh?

Orange, it’s kind of like eggplant, you either love it or hate it, and we’ve received comments from both camps. I used to hate it. I mean, don’t get me wrong, I don’t stomp on orange flowers or throw water balloons at those who proudly wear the seemingly unconventional color, but I don’t have a speck of orange in my house or in my wardrobe, and the closest I come to orange is the humble orange itself, but I have come to terms with it as a design element.

Oh no, not orange.
When I started here, I was immediately thrown into a site redesign and thought, “Oh no…orange. How am I going to make that work?” It wasn’t easy and it wasn’t elegant, but the site went up in a whirlwind and it was a huge departure from previous sites. As a designer, I’m always temporarily happy with what I’ve done, but always looking to improve, or to take things to the next level. It’s been a rocky relationship, me and orange, but I have a different feeling about it than I did many, many designs ago. I no longer see it as a hindrance (wow, did I just say that out loud?). I see it as fun and exciting, and challenging (in a good way). Now, embarking on a refresh, I embrace orange instead of dreading it (Oops, I said it again).

Being orange.
For Buffalo State, it really is more than just our official school color. It’s part of who we are. It is Buffalo State. If you notice when you’re on campus, students are wearing orange T-shirts, bags, hair, shoes, socks—you name it. Although orange is a color highly accepted by younger audiences, when people tell us how they feel about Buffalo State, they use words like enthusiasm, creativity, determination, vibrancy, confidence, excitement, energy, fun, ambition—that’s orange! We all really knew this all along, but maybe never stopped to make the connection.

I’m not asking you to paint your living room orange. You don’t even have to like orange, but if you start to think about all the “orange” things about our campus, you may start to embrace what it symbolizes and get a little more excited, and maybe even start to say, “Hey, it’s really not that bad.” It’s our school color and should be shouted from the mountain tops, even on the Web!

Hooray for orange! Hooray for us!

Posted by Sue Zilliox at 06:20 AM | Trackback URI