In honor of Black History Month 2020, I led the art direction for a commemorative campaign across Radio One’s digital platforms and NewsOne.com. The campaign spotlighted ten legendary Hall of Fame athletes who were shaped by Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs)—a tribute to both athletic excellence and the legacy of Black institutions in American sports history.

Challenge: The goal was to craft a campaign that didn’t just inform, but emotionally resonate—cutting through social media noise with visuals that felt as impactful as the athletes themselves. We needed to design a unified look for a series that spanned decades of sports history, ensuring each piece felt timeless, reverent, and distinct—without relying on recycled imagery or clichéd Black History Month tropes.

Solution:I developed a bold visual system rooted in nostalgia and design history. Drawing from vintage trading cards, I created a cohesive set of illustrations using double exposures, distressed textures, and archival color palettes. Each visual was treated with care—custom-layered to spotlight the featured athlete while reflecting the aesthetic of their era. One key detail: each card’s title typography nodded to the most iconic font styles of the athlete’s prime decade, adding a subtle but deliberate sense of time and place. The final campaign lived across Instagram, Facebook, and NewsOne.com, where it served as a visually rich, emotionally resonant tribute to Black excellence in sports and education.

Role: Creative Director
Team: iOne Digital In-House Creative
Illustrations: Mariano Henestrosa