On the Brain

Overview

On the Brain is a fictional mental-health nonprofit built as the umbrella brand for this campaign, aimed squarely at ending the stigma around mental health struggles. Over eight weeks, the project grew from an early concept sketch into a full, multi-touchpoint campaign: a first mobile app, a pair of CTA posters, an engineered packaging system, printed button pins, a postcard mailer insert, and a 3D diorama of a pop-up installation concept.

The pieces gathered here — the packaging, the pin, the postcard, and the two CTA posters — represent about two of those eight weeks. The app and the diorama aren’t pictured; they didn’t photograph well enough to document properly, but they were very much part of the full scope of the project.

The Brand

The whole campaign is carried by a single mascot: a smiling, blushing brain character, rendered in a warm, rounded illustration style that turns a clinical subject into something approachable and a little funny. The wordmark “On the Brain” is set in a bouncy, retro script, paired with a warm palette of burnt orange, teal, and coral pink, with gradient sunset backgrounds throughout. The tone is playful and human rather than clinical, built around two central lines: “End the Stigma” and “Mental Health Matters.”

Packaging & Unboxing

The centerpiece of this slice of the campaign is a fully engineered mailer box — a checkerboard exterior in the brand’s orange and white, a teal interior, and a self-locking tuck closure so it opens and stays open without tape. The mascot and supporting copy wrap around the side panels, so the box reads as branded from every angle.

Opening the box is its own small moment: lifting the lid reveals a teal interior and a gradient “End the Stigma” insert card sitting right on top, before you even get to the pin or the postcard underneath.

Inside the Box

A two-sided postcard does double duty as both a keepsake and a short introduction to the organization — the front carries the gradient “End the Stigma” wordmark, the back reads like a short letter from the team, defining what “mental health stigma” actually means in plain language.

A branded button pin — the mascot giving a thumbs up inside a teal roundel reading “Mental Health Matters” — sits pinned to a second insert card, so it arrives ready to wear rather than loose in the box.

CTA Poster Series

The two 24 × 36 posters take a phrase already living in social-media dating culture — “red flag” and “green flag” — and repoint it at mental health. Instead of describing a partner’s dealbreakers, the flags describe how you respond when someone you know is struggling: dismiss it (red flag) or support it (green flag). Same mascot, same teal background, same bold headline treatment across both — only the flag color and message change, keeping the pair reading as a matched set from across a room.

Reflection

This project was really a full brand system disguised as a school assignment — one mascot, one voice, and one palette carried across app UI, packaging engineering, print, and a physical installation concept, inside eight weeks. The pieces shown here came together in roughly two of those weeks, which is part of why the packaging in particular got as much construction detail as it did. The campaign extended well beyond what’s shown here — the first mobile app and 3D diorama were both real parts of the project, even without images to back them up.