2019 National Design Awards
Social Media Animations

As part of their Peter A. Krueger Internship Program, Cooper Hewitt assigns each intern to work on an independent, department-specific project of their choice. Over the summer, the Communications + Marketing Department was seeking a different approach to raise public awareness of Cooper Hewitt’s annual National Design Awards, a program that brings national recognition to the people and institutions that have enriched everyday life through design. I focused my independent project on using Cooper Hewitt’s social media, namely Instagram, as a platform to generate interest in the upcoming Awards and winners.

Working with the Director of Communications + Marketing and the Social Media Manager, I researched digital media trends and best practices in engaging a social media audience. Cooper Hewitt was looking into methods to increase viewership and engagement with their Instagram followers, and Instagram’s Stories function became an incredibly viable option to do so. Using information from both the museum and my research, I began development of an animated Stories sequence highlighting a notable work of each NDA winner. Every story segment transforms provided images into a short and eye-catching presentation of each respective work and was published during the week of the 2019 National Design Awards to promote the event.

Below is a selection of animations from the project, each highlighting a significant design from a 2019 National Design Awards winner.