Themes

To gain an initial idea on how to focus the project it is essential that a theme is developed in order to gain a greater stance upon the ways in which the design will appear. Greetings cards, and stationery ranges often have a name, a factor in which directs the products outcome. Due to this it is essential that a theme, and name is quickly developed in order to allow for further research and the design process to begin. From this name, a more condensed brief will be developed in which allows myself to gain a greater focus upon the project's direction.

General themes were initially collected in a mind map format in order to visualise the card/stationery themes currently available. These were gained primarily from the initial research stage, a main theme in which was expressed was that of love. Other themes were then added to the mind map in order to exhibit further ideas. These ideas often bounced off one another, with ideas frequently influencing further designs.  Some of the strongest themes have been listed below:

• Family
• Diversity
• The British way of life
• Nature
• Environment 
• Food and Beverage 
• Humour

As all of these topic areas are very broad, further mindmaps were developed outlining key points from each. 

From completing this exercise it allowed for certain themes to be excluded due to their general boring nature. After completing this the key themes in which were left include: Diversity, British life, and Food. When discussing these ideas with peers, it has decided that the strongest idea was that of diversity, as it highlighted the company's ethos, and broke current card/stationery set boundaries. Due to this, it has been decided to take this further, and develop a specific brief for this theme.