The White Sox marketing team prepared a clear brief for a non-traditional product launch; design something rooted in culture that represents our city. Chicago is filled with pop culture personalities and moments, but those are overused and lack relevance so we challenged ourselves to tap into the characteristics (not characters) that make our city influential.

The jersey was expected to draw attention, but we needed to give rational for the approach, which created an opportunity for use to tell a bigger story of everything that led to this moment; 125 years of innovation and influence.

I approached this similarly to a branding project and created a system of grids and design elements inspired by elements of the jersey and the city of Chicago. While developing the story for the design system I wrote the line Bred In Chicago, which represents both the fact of being born and raised in the city, and the colorway of black and red made famous by Jordan. Bred In Chicago ultimately became the campaign tagline, creating a personality of attitude and pride that drove the layered aesthetic of constant motion that spawned two spots, OOH billboards and posters, a social campaign, and animation videos for the stadium Jumbotron and new team store.