In 2024, I was invited to join the Naukka Group team to redesign and rethink the identity of Serious Science, one of the company's media projects with a significant legacy and a respected, recognizable brand in the Russian-speaking community. Once a large company with an office in the center of Moscow, today Naukka is a small team of Russian-speaking immigrants based all over the world. The team consists of multifaceted editors, designers, and product enthusiasts working hard to adapt Naukka’s media outlets to a new political reality, where collaborations with major Russian brands have been replaced by those free of military agendas and tax obligations in Russia. Naukka’s mission is elegantly focused on intellectual exploration: it aims to give more voice and space to scientists of all backgrounds, as their tremendous work and research often get overlooked in the oversaturated capitalist landscape. Serious Science (SeSci) is a media platform with a large portfolio of materials targeting Naukka's English-speaking audience. All content is in English, and most features include an English-speaking expert or scientist. Created in 2014, SeSci’s identity had little connection to the visual identity of Naukka's other projects. A few years ago, the design agency Masterskaya gave Naukka’s brand a significant update, introducing a series of design elements to be applied across its media outlets. My task was to rethink how these elements worked together, bringing more coherence to the identity and interface of Serious Science while paying tribute to the beautiful work done by the Masterskaya team.
Following multiple rounds of discovery sessions with Naukka’s team members, site mapping, and wireframing, I developed the concept of thematic color indexing. This set a new visual tone and provided a structural foundation for the site's extensive content library. The posts were categorized into eight themes: AI, Energy, Space, Climate, NeuroTech, BioTech, DeepTech, and Impact. Each category received an updated, three-instance version of an icon from the system previously developed by Masterskaya, along with a dedicated color palette. The color work was the most challenging part of this project, as the palettes needed to be balanced collectively, reflect the essence of each topic, and meet all accessibility standards in both default and inverted usages. With the new color system in place, I shifted focus to designing user interface elements. The main emphasis was on publication pages and the development of editorial tools that could be easily used by editors managing the site. This project has taught me a great deal about user experience and the media industry, especially regarding editorial processes and content management systems. The Naukka team was pleased with my work and offered me a part-time role as Art Director, which I have been successfully fulfilling since September 2024. My responsibilities at Naukka include a significant amount of project and product management, as well as optimizing the use of various graphic assets across the media outlets.
