Story 7: Homepage Tour

This is the Voices of the Land Homepage. We worked with our Steering Committee and community in developing the appearance.

Hero Image

The first thing I notice on the homepage is the hero image, which was created by Tashina Makokis. Tashina Makokis is a designer and artist from the Saddle Lake Cree Nation in Treaty 6 Territory. The original Voices of Amiskwaciy homepage depicted the night sky and this was still a popular choice for community in creating this site. Every Indigenous nation has their own stories about the night sky and constellations.
The figures in the image are visiting over a fire, sharing tea, and presumably stories. There are figures in the background forest which can represent ancestors, spirits, or the stories themselves.

Logo

The Voices of the Land logo represents Indigenous oral tradition. The steering committee chose to utilize the same logo as Voices of Amiskwaciy because they felt it continued to reflect the project in its new iteration.

The logo is designed in a circular pattern as circles have special and varied meaning to Indigenous peoples in North America. The 4 circles at the top of the logo represent stars which also signify stories. Knowledge keepers have said that stories are associated to the stars and have been passed down for generations. Stars are also depicted in the homepage image, above a group of people gathering. Telling stories is an important way of preserving Indigenous culture and history. Often stories are passed from an older person to a younger person so traditions carry on. The two people in the logo are united to represent the interconnection and sharing that happens through this type of knowledge transfer.
The image and creative concept of the logo was designed by Lese Skidmore. The text and logo style guide were developed by Craig Pinder, Team Lead, Design and Production Services for Edmonton Public Library.

Home Page

Top Menu: The buttons here: Share Your Story, Add a Word List, Log in/Log Out. & My Account are all activities you can do on the platform.
Site Menu: Stories, Categories, Communities, Collections and Dictionary are all different entry ways into browsing content on the site. We will review each later.
About Us (also in the footer): This is where you can learn about the project history, platform concepts, design and artwork and most importantly the project Values