A subversive protest brand.
Branding and graphic design have enormous power in contemporary protest and political discourse. Graphic language can amplify messages and articulate distinctive voices, be it in a vernacular impromptu style or a tightly controlled aesthetic. This brief required a comprehensive survey of the field to uncover new insights into catalyzing protest, ultimately developing a shareable, accessible form of protest.
Meme Streets is a subversive protest brand on a mission to accelerate positive change in the world by using the unconventional tool of humor in protest. From the jesters in royal courts to the memes and TikTok trends of the 21st century, humor and sarcasm have a long history as means of criticism. Echoing these traditions, Meme Streets uses humor to activate, enrage, and involve people in movements—pushing the boundaries of traditional protest. This unapologetic approach to calling out injustices brings energy to social movements, attracts more attention, makes it fun to be involved, and creates a bond through humor.
Meme Streets is a subversive protest brand on a mission to accelerate positive change in the world by using the unconventional tool of humor in protest. From the jesters in royal courts to the memes and TikTok trends of the 21st century, humor and sarcasm have a long history as means of criticism. Echoing these traditions, Meme Streets uses humor to activate, enrage, and involve people in movements—pushing the boundaries of traditional protest. This unapologetic approach to calling out injustices brings energy to social movements, attracts more attention, makes it fun to be involved, and creates a bond through humor.
Brand Strategy
Visual Identity
App Design
Motion Design
Copywriting
A meme-spirited concept.
The brand employs a series of memetic strategies to protest—leveraging humor, accessibility, editability, relatability, and virality. Acting as low barriers to artistic expression and civic engagement, one of the most important aspects of memes is the notion of creating, remaking, remixing, and resharing. This DIY, collaborative nature (both of memes and of protest) was a key concept in the creation of the brand.
The primary logo’s use of Impact font strongly represents meme culture, while the graffiti-like, hand drawn bubble letters highlight the importance of the DIY element of protest to the brand. This intentional nod to graffiti represents the shared goal of both street art and memes: to disrupt and challenge narratives in a public space. The secondary logo is a dynamic adaptation of the primary lockup. This is a visual representation of the nature of memes, constantly being iterated on with slight variations
The toolkit demonstrates multiple ways to easily replicate and adapt (hello meme lifecycle!) the essence of the brand for varying instances of protest. It is as relevant to a single person protesting a minor, everyday frustration as it is to a large group protesting social change.
Once again embracing the participatory nature of memes, the site’s intuitive meme generator allows users to create, customize, and download their own memes—as well as check out other uploaded protest memes for inspiration.
The platform also offers free downloadable protest posters, open source fonts / files, and templates for social media, pins and stickers, and DIY signs and banners.
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The Process