Voice & visual standards
How the museum's identity is applied — logo, color, type, voice, and imagery. Token values live in the design system; this guide explains the intent and rules behind them.
Principles
Authority through restraint. Cream is the field, Cinnabar is the punctuation, and the photography carries the weight. Every element earns its place — one thousand no's for every yes.
Warm & archival
A cream field signals institutional weight and gives historical photography room to breathe. We avoid stark white pages.
One accent, used well
Cinnabar marks consequence — a section's start, the most important link. Teal carries primary actions. Gold is a quiet highlight. Never decoration for its own sake.
Type does the work
Heavy Nunito Sans and generous rhythm create hierarchy without ornament. Softly rounded corners keep it human, not corporate.
Brand & Logo
The museum's logotype is the signature of the institution. Give it room, keep it monochrome (or the supplied RGB lockups), and never let it compete with photography.
Maintain clear space equal to the cap-height of the wordmark on all sides. Nothing — type, edges, or imagery — enters this zone.
Over images, use the reversed mark on a darkened area of the photo so contrast stays AA or better.
Do
- Use the supplied SVG so it stays crisp at any size.
- Reverse to white on dark backgrounds.
- Keep minimum width ≥ 120px on screen.
- Preserve the original proportions.
Don't
- Recolor, add gradients, or apply effects.
- Stretch, condense, or rotate the logotype.
- Place on a busy photo without a scrim.
- Reconstruct it from system fonts.
The logo red is Brick #BF2F28 — Logo only — never in UI Minimum size: 120px wide on screen. In the site header the mark sits at ~70px tall.
Color palette
The rationalized brand palette. Click any swatch or shade to copy its hex. Cinnabar is the red used throughout the website; Brick is reserved for the logo only.
Each brand color carries a usable range. Lighten toward the left for fills and tints; deepen toward the right for hovers, text, and contrast. The outlined chip is the canonical brand value.
Utility colors that signal feedback — never decoration or brand expression. Reserve for confirmations, errors, cautions, and informational notices.
Brick is the true color of the brand mark and lives only in the logo. It never appears in website UI — buttons, eyebrows, dividers, icons, and links all use Cinnabar instead.
Typography
Three families. Nunito Sans carries every heading, body, and UI label. Philosopher is reserved for display pull-quotes and italic emphasis only. JetBrains Mono handles metadata, dates, and hex values.
Weights 400 · 600 · 800. Headings ship at 800; body at 400; nav at 600.
Weight 400 / 700, often italic. Pull-quotes and a phrase of emphasis inside a heading.
Weights 400 / 500. Dates, breadcrumbs, mono eyebrows, hex values, code.
Voice
We are stewards of one of the most consequential stories in American history, told from the site where Dr. King was killed. The way we write is part of how we honor it — truthful, dignified, and unafraid to call the reader to act.
The museum serves a wide public — from a sixth-grader on a first field trip to a scholar citing primary sources. The voice stays constant; the vocabulary and depth flex to the reader.
Students & educators
K-12 and higher-ed groups. Clear, age-aware language; never condescending. Connect history to civics and to now.
Families & general visitors
Tourists and locals planning a day. Warm, practical, welcoming — answer the logistics, set the emotional tone.
Scholars & researchers
Historians, journalists, students of the movement. Precise dates, names, and sourcing; no embellishment.
Activists & change-makers
People who see themselves in the struggle. Present-tense, galvanizing — the movement as unfinished work.
Members & donors
Sustainers of the institution. Grateful, specific about impact; invite partnership, never guilt.
The Memphis community
Neighbors and descendants. Rooted, respectful of local memory; the Lorraine is theirs as much as ours.
Truthful & precise
Name dates, places, and people accurately. Cite, don't paraphrase, the historical record. Never invent quotations.
Dignified, never sensational
The subject is grave. Let the facts and the photography carry weight; no hype, no clickbait, no exclamation marks.
Present-tense & activating
Frame history as a living call. The struggle did not end in 1968. Invite the reader to be a change maker.
Plain-spoken & accessible
Short sentences. Concrete nouns. Define terms a newcomer won't know. Clarity is a form of respect.
Inclusive & humanizing
Center people, not abstractions — the foot soldiers, the named and the unnamed. Write so every reader belongs in the story.
On voice
"381 days that began with one woman's refusal and changed a nation's conscience."
"This history is more important than ever. We invite you to be a change maker."
"Self-guided · 90 minutes. Plan your visit."
Off voice
"The CRAZIEST 381 days in history you won't believe!"
"A tragic chapter, now safely behind us."
"An unforgettable, must-see, bucket-list experience!!!"
Media & Imagery
Documentary and archival first. Real photography of the museum, its galleries, and the movement. Prefer licensed photography; use monochrome pinstriped placeholders only during layout — never decorative stock.
Also available: 1:1 and 21:9. Real photography should lean documentary and archival — grayscale or lightly desaturated, never over-stylized.