{
  "id": "identity-system-and-rationale",
  "title": "Communication design: an identity system and its rationale",
  "discipline": "Design",
  "taskType": "Identity system",
  "version": "0.1",
  "updated": "2026-06-30",
  "summary": "One task. The student designs a visual identity for a named organisation, applies it across a set of items, and writes up the reasoning so another designer could work from it. Five things to mark, each described at four levels.",
  "url": "https://readyho.com/rubrics/identity-system-and-rationale",
  "licence": {
    "name": "Creative Commons Attribution 4.0",
    "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/"
  },
  "attribution": "ReadyHo rubric library. Communication design: an identity system and its rationale, version 0.1. https://readyho.com/rubrics/identity-system-and-rationale. Creative Commons Attribution 4.0.",
  "status": "Version 0.1 in the ReadyHo rubric library.",
  "bands": [
    {
      "value": 1,
      "name": "Not yet competent"
    },
    {
      "value": 2,
      "name": "Developing"
    },
    {
      "value": 3,
      "name": "Competent"
    },
    {
      "value": 4,
      "name": "Strong"
    }
  ],
  "criteria": [
    {
      "name": "Strategic fit",
      "measures": "Whether the identity answers the brief for this organisation rather than a generic one.",
      "levels": {
        "1": "The rationale describes the organisation in terms that would fit any organisation in the sector. Nothing in the identity would need to change if the client were replaced with a different one.",
        "2": "A specific position is identified in the rationale, but the design does not follow from it. The audience, the sector conventions, and the constraints are described and then are not used to decide anything.",
        "3": "The rationale states who the identity addresses, what it has to do, and where it will be seen, and each of the main design decisions is traceable to one of those. Where the identity departs from the conventions of its sector, the reason is given.",
        "4": "As competent, and the rationale states what the identity deliberately does not do, and names a direction that was tested and set aside, together with the reason for setting it aside."
      }
    },
    {
      "name": "The mark and the wordmark",
      "measures": "Construction, drawing quality, and behaviour at the sizes and in the contexts of use.",
      "levels": {
        "1": "The mark is drawn with inconsistent weights, uneven curves, or unresolved joins, and is presented at one size only. The wordmark is typed rather than set, with no adjustment to spacing or fit.",
        "2": "Construction is even and the drawing is clean, but the mark loses its distinguishing feature below a certain size and no small size version has been made. Letter spacing in the wordmark is untouched at display size, where it is most visible.",
        "3": "The mark holds its silhouette at the smallest stated size and in one colour. Optical corrections have been made where geometry alone would read incorrectly. The wordmark is spaced, and redrawn where the typeface needed it, and the relationship between mark and wordmark is fixed and specified.",
        "4": "As competent, and the system carries a considered set of variants for the contexts it will meet, with a stated threshold at which each variant is used rather than the choice being left to preference."
      }
    },
    {
      "name": "Typography and colour as a system",
      "measures": "Whether the supporting elements form a system with stated rules, rather than a set of individual choices.",
      "levels": {
        "1": "Typefaces and colours are selected without stated reason and are used inconsistently across the items shown. There is no hierarchy, or the hierarchy changes from one item to the next.",
        "2": "The palette and the type selection are consistent but undefined. Sizes, weights, and spacing are set by eye on each item, and colours are shown as swatches with no values and no assigned roles.",
        "3": "The typeface selection is stated with the role it plays at each level of hierarchy, and a type scale is defined. Colours are given with values for the media in use and are assigned to roles rather than to individual items. Text and background pairings meet a stated contrast requirement.",
        "4": "As competent, and the system holds under pressure. It is shown working on a dense item such as a form or a table, and on a constrained one such as a small label, without new rules being invented for either."
      }
    },
    {
      "name": "Application across the system",
      "measures": "Whether the identity works consistently across items with different constraints.",
      "levels": {
        "1": "The items shown are the ones that flatter the mark, presented at a single scale and mostly on plain backgrounds. Items with real constraints are absent from the set.",
        "2": "A range of items is shown, but each is treated as a separate composition. The same problem is solved in two different ways in two places, with no reason given for the difference.",
        "3": "The set includes at least one item that constrains the identity, such as a small format, single colour reproduction, or a fixed template. The same rules can be seen operating in each item, and the identity is recognisable across all of them.",
        "4": "As competent, and the set covers the range the organisation actually needs, including items that will be produced by people who are not designers, with the rules stated in a form those people could follow."
      }
    },
    {
      "name": "The rationale as a document",
      "measures": "Whether the written rationale explains decisions, and whether another designer could apply the system from it.",
      "levels": {
        "1": "The rationale describes what the identity looks like and asserts qualities such as modern or approachable without evidence. Nothing in it could be used to reproduce the identity.",
        "2": "The rationale explains the thinking behind the main mark but leaves the rest of the system undocumented. Measurements, colour values, and clear space appear in the visuals and are not stated anywhere in the text.",
        "3": "Each significant decision is explained with the reason it was taken. Clear space, minimum sizes, colour values, type sizes, and incorrect uses are specified in a form another designer could follow without asking a question.",
        "4": "As competent, and the document separates the rules that must be held from the ones that may be interpreted, so the system can be extended to items nobody anticipated without losing coherence."
      }
    }
  ],
  "evaluationQuality": {
    "measured": false,
    "agreement": null,
    "sampleSize": null,
    "measuredOn": null,
    "note": "Agreement between AI evaluation and practitioner judgment has not been measured for this rubric. These fields are null because there is no measurement, not because the result was zero. The figures will be published at readyho.com/rubrics whether they are favourable or not."
  }
}