When I first sat down to help build The Scholarly Sewist, I wasn’t just designing another logo - I was helping to visualize a movement. Born in the stillness and uncertainty of the 2020 pandemic, The Scholarly Sewist has since become a signature brand for Dr. Reka Barton, a traveling educator, craftivist, and scholar whose work bridges fashion, academia, and cultural storytelling. Over the past several years of her PhD journey, the brand has gained momentum and attention for the way it celebrates women of color in academia, both as thinkers and as style icons.

As the designer, my challenge was clear: how do you build a visual identity that seamlessly merges scholarship and style?

Blending Fashion & Academia

Dr. Barton envisioned The Scholarly Sewist as more than a brand. It was a lifestyle statement. She wanted something that reflected her dual worlds: the structured discipline of academia and the creative fluidity of fashion. Using Adobe Illustrator, I constructed a mark that embodied both.

The result was a clean, modern emblem built around an elegant, diploma-esque “S”, threaded subtly with a needle motif. It’s a quiet detail that carries weight, a nod to the intellectual labor and creative resilience that define women of color scholars. The simplicity of the form also makes it ideal for silkscreening on apparel and accessories, bridging the academic and the wearable.

Building Visual Language

The logo was only the beginning. Together with Dr. Barton, we developed a broader visual language that reflected her world: bold yet intentional typography, a neutral palette punctuated by earthy golds and deep browns, and photography that centers authenticity, travel, and Black womanhood in scholarly spaces.

The brand’s look had to feel academic without being austere, fashion-forward without being commercialized. Every design choice - from typeface to texture - was about honoring the lived experience of the educated, creative, global Black woman.

From Design To Digital Storytelling

Our creative collaboration naturally evolved into Manuscript Mixtapes, a multimedia project exploring the intersections of scholarship, identity, and creativity. Here, The Scholarly Sewist aesthetic took on a new digital life, merging visuals and narrative into immersive storytelling experiences for her article drops.

That same spirit extended into Craftivism for the Soul, a joint initiative with Futureverse Studios. This brand uses visual design and digital media to explore sustainability, self-expression, and slow fashion as acts of social resistance. My role was to help translate that vision into cohesive visual campaigns where color, typography, and motion graphics carried the same heart and intention as a handcrafted stitch.

Designing With Purpose

Working on The Scholarly Sewist has been more than a design assignment. It's a lesson in visual anthropology. Every iteration reminds me that design isn’t just decoration; it’s narrative. The brand identity became a vessel for stories of resilience, intellect, and cultural pride.

Seeing The Scholarly Sewist grow from a pandemic-born idea into a recognizable brand and creative movement has been deeply rewarding. It’s proof that when design is rooted in purpose, and when it honors the lived experiences of those it represents, it can do more than look beautiful. It speaks.