How do you get to know someone who can't talk?

Jazz Pharmaceuticals

Art Direction

Experience Design

Overview

unspoken symphony was created for all those who struggle to express themselves verbally. Inspired by a little girl who can’t speak, it transforms artwork into an original melody, giving the world a chance to communicate and connect with loved ones like never before. What started as a website for a small segment of the epilepsy community became something the rest of the world wanted to take a part in.

Role

I ideated, prototyped and pitched the concept for the project which led to a much greater scope around a full campaign after the initial excitement. My partner and I were given final say around every touchpoint and creative direction along with managing relationships with vendors and clients.

Scope

Experience & Brand Strategy

Creative Technology

User Research

Web Design

CRM Strategy

360 Campaign

Video Shoot

Process

Prototype

Experience & Brand Strategy

Campaign

Reception & Life

Reflections

Recognition 🏆

Cannes Lions

1x Shortlist

Clio Awards

2x Silver

1x Bronze

1x Shortlist

London International Awards

2x Shortlists

The Creative Floor

2x Best of Category

1x Best Young Talent

PM Society

1x Gold

Prototype

Ideation | Paper Prototyping | Pitching

“It's not easy to get to know someone who can't talk. It teaches you to pay a lot more attention to little things.”

Tim, Riley’s dad

This quote stuck in our heads. At the time my partner and I were working on turning long form videos into clips for social media when we heard this line from Tim and all we could do was look at each other in disbelief. A social butterfly and a mother of 3, we had never experienced this. For weeks we kept looking at each other and trying to figure out, is there anything we can do to help?

What we noticed

While working on other content we realized that other kids had art in their backgrounds. While these kids may not talk, they do express themselves through art. Every line, every color is a choice they made.

Connecting the dots

A couple years earlier I had explored turning photos of pedestrians with umbrellas on the streets into music sheets after thinking they looked like music notes.

So we started thinking

“What if we could turn her drawings into melodies?”

We quickly prototyped it and prepared a pitch, hoping to sell the idea to Jazz Pharmaceuticals (Formerly Greenwich Biosciences). Jazz was one of our accounts with expertise in this space. They immediately saw the need for this and committed to help bring it to life with my partner and I leading it.

What families said of the concept

“This would be really neat for my son and my daughter to do together. Maybe it could also help with familial bonds with siblings.”

“I appreciate you guys thinking outside the box too. This isn't what the average person would come up with... I think it's fantastic.”

“You work so hard to connect with your special kid... you're creating a sound of your child that never would have existed... what an amazing gift for a parent.”

Experience & Brand Strategy

Web Strategy | CRM | Branding

Brand guidelines

Early on we decided on the product's experience as a brand. We defined it as a straight forward activity for the families to experience a moment together while taking visual cues from the kid's art for visual inspiration.

Web experience

We constantly iterated on the ideal web flow based on what everyone wanted. We tested these flows and the concept with our core audiences who gave us invaluable feedback on how to move forward.

CRM flow

In health-care, any mention of a drug requires disclaimers so to keep the experience focused on a shared moment we convinced the client not to advertise their drugs through this platform… At all.

“The families should walk away with something” we thought. So we developed an output for our software that would let user download the music sheet and video of the melody generated from their art. We heard some families framed these which warmed our hearts.

Campaign

Launch Plan | Assets | Video Shoot

Advocacy collaborations

We talked with category influencers, advocacy groups and the media to prepare a comprehensive launch plan aimed at getting as many eyes as possible on the project.

Touchpoints

Various pieces were made to be distributed online and physically. We made coloring books and branded markers to share at walks and social posts for individuals to share with their followers.

Video shoot

Mid pandemic we shot a video at Tim & Riley's house. Our production partners helped facilitate the experience with specialized equipment, resulting in the video below.

We also crafted a couple explainer videos talking about how the melody maker works and the story that inspired it.

How unspoken works

We wanted to pull the curtain behind how unspoken generates music from art, so we crafted an explainer video that sat on the website.

Case study video

To show off the concept we also built a case study video that goes into a little more detail.

Reception & Life

Tears | Features | Gallery Shows

unspoken symphony launched in 2020 to widespread acclaim from the community.

Our website's featured art gallery, initially open to everyone, was quickly restricted to epilepsy community members due to an overwhelming number of submissions. Last I heard, we had received over 8,000 submissions. (As of a year post launch)

Since then, while unspoken has received limited ongoing support beyond website maintenance and the occasional art book printing, it has taken on a life of its own. An art therapist exhibited patient work in NYC in Fall 2024, it's used in educational settings, and we were featured on a college website. Jazz remains enthusiastic about supporting projects like the May 2024 art exhibit I recently discovered.

We're continually humbled and grateful for the community's love and support for unspoken. There's an endless stream of ideas, tears, gratitude, and kind words. It's truly a heartwarming experience. Try it out yourself!

Live site

My reflections on what I learned with this project and areas I feel could be improved:

Learnings

unspoken taught me the importance of proactively pursuing ideas and ensuring their realization. Nobody requested unspoken; it emerged from our deep care for a family with a need. Our initial challenge was pitching the concept, which became easier once we aligned it with the client's business objectives. At that point, it's difficult to say no.

Small teams are key for projects to run quickly without losing the original vision. Our core team was 3 people as our Executive Creative Director emphasized that we were the guardians of this idea. We ran with it and did so much.

Looking back, I should have asked for more help. unspoken was my first big project and the responsibility for almost every decision was down to my partner and I. I'd never done PR work, I felt out of my league around the branding expectations or the Ad campaign. I should have asked for more help and resources so I could focus on the general experience and reviewing work.

Areas of Opportunity

The final music generation algorithm didn't quite fulfil my vision for the outputs. It lacked the variety that the paper prototype had. While the range of the music generation is quite wide, if I could do it again I would have pushed for an even wider range more focused on variety.

We've heard many times from users that they wish the website had a lot more features like drawing directly on the website, more instruments, etc… I switched accounts and departments at the time which meant I no longer worked on unspoken, otherwise the opportunities to keep pushing would have been there.

Overall I was more worried on the timing and feasibility of the web experience so I was never quite satisfied with the UI. I was also juggling multiple parts of the project and accounts, so as a UX designer having to do the UI without practice… I wasn't able to quite translate the envisioned direction into visuals and interactions.

Special Shout-outs:

Copywriter

Andrea Branchini

Account Lead

Brittany Vella

Experience Lead

Leesa Wytock

UX Designer

Karen Wong

ECD

Frank Mazzola

Client Lead

Kelly Watkins

There are obviously many more people who helped out. While I may not have the space here, thank you 👏

What interesting problems could we solve together?

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