Hobby horse 2025
Cal Poly ASI held their second annual Hobby Horse competition and needed posters, stickers and T-shirts designed. I was given the event details: date, time, and title, along with a requirement to use Cal Poly’s colors. This project taught me the importance of clear communication with vendors and design requesters in order to meet deadlines.
My Process
From the start, I knew I wanted to incorporate illustration into this project. I began with basic sketches of a hobby horse but initially made it too realistic, simplifying the sketch down to make it more playful and cartoonish.
First round
Odering t-shirts
Next, I created a rider and drafted a rough layout for the poster. While I was fairly happy with the illustration, the rider needed adjustments, and the overall layout required better flow.
Sketching things out
I refined the rider to be more diverse and student-like for relatability, then positioned it above the text to function as a logo and adjusted the poster layout.
final round
The final step was sourcing t-shirt vendors. After comparing quotes and emailing back and forth with several companies, we chose Left Coast, as they fit the event team’s budget and had the desired shirt color.
