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Refreshing a Legal Aid Brand for Clarity, Access & Community

Role: Development Assistant & Designer
Org: Legal Services of Northern California
Type: Social Media, Digital Comms, Brand Strategy
Tools: Canva, Illustrator, Figma, Meta Business Suite

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The Challenge

Legal Services of Northern California (LSNC) provides vital legal aid to low-income and marginalized communities across 23 counties. At the time that I joined their team I observed that their digital outreach, especially on social media, was visually inconsistent, text-heavy, and lacking accessibility. Their feed didn’t reflect the care, trust, or clarity of the work they actually did.

My goal: Bring cohesion, clarity, and visual empathy to LSNC’s digital presence so that community members could better understand and access their services.

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The Process

I started by identifying four priorities:

  1. Visual consistency

    • Created a flexible, on-brand visual system using clean type, color pairings, and illustration.

  2. Accessibility

    • Increased font legibility, color contrast, and balance of visuals-to-text.

    • Simplified language and ensured designs met basic readability standards.

  3. Storytelling over announcements

    • Introduced “Client Story” posts that highlighted real people helped by LSNC (with privacy considered).

    • Designed branded templates for key campaigns like Valentine Run, Giving Tuesday, and Know the Law.

  4. Tone shift

    • Moved from formal/legal tone to calm, approachable messaging across visual assets.

Results

After the redesign, LSNC’s Instagram and Facebook feeds reflected a consistent, professional presence.
Community engagement (likes, shares, comments) steadily improved, and internal staff began actively sharing content—helping unify external messaging across the organization.

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Notable Improvements:

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  • Clear headers and space for image breathing room

  • Brand colors reused across templates

  • Diverse and inclusive illustrations

  • Direct calls to action with clean visuals

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Reflection

This project taught me how to bridge brand integrity with accessibility, especially in a mission-driven context. I made sure to be intentional about creating systems that could be reused by other team members after I left. This included creating templates for their quarterly newsletters and emails to be used for the foreseeable future. If I had more time, I would’ve unified all documentation that is sent out to clients and volunteers.

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