Hang
Built to Bring People Together
We're living through a loneliness epidemic. Despite being more "connected" than ever, people report feeling increasingly isolated. Social media promised community but delivered echo chambers. Dating apps promised relationships but created endless swiping. Meanwhile, real-world social infrastructure (community centers, third spaces, casual gathering spots) continued to disappear.
We approached Hang as something that should feel different every time you encounter it, much like the people and communities that make up Hang. There is no single way to "look like Hang". Instead, the identity creates a framework for different expressions to exist together. It gives the brand enough character to be recognisable, but enough freedom to feel alive. Ultimately, we weren't designing a brand that tells people what community looks like. We were creating one that leaves room for them to define it themselves.
Strategy, Visual Identity, Motion Design, Brand Illustrations, Website Design, Product Design
The idea
Fostering social connections
The insight that shaped everything: technology should be the bridge, not the destination. Hang isn't competing with social media; it's offering an alternative path entirely. While other platforms measure success in daily active users, Hang measures success in lasting friendships formed offline.
The foundation
A spectrum of diversity
Hang's visual identity was built around one simple idea: connection thrives through difference. From a fluid logo that adapts like the communities it represents, to a 15-colour palette that gives each group room to express itself, every element was designed to feel flexible, diverse and alive. Custom illustrations extend that thinking across the brand, creating a visual language that feels human and inclusive while giving Hang the freedom to speak to different people, interests and communities without losing its identity.
Digital experience
Designed for real-world connections
The website and app prioritize showcasing Hang's diverse user base, demonstrating the platform's ability to connect people from all backgrounds. Critically, online interaction is intentionally limited to event-specific discussions within established communities, ensuring digital sparks translate into meaningful physical experiences.
The user experience deliberately creates friction around endless browsing while removing friction from event discovery and attendance. Every design decision asks: Does this encourage real-world connection?
Working with Glyn felt less like hiring a design studio and more like having a true partner in the room. They took the time to understand what we were building and why, challenged our thinking, explored ideas deeply, and never settled for the first good answer.
What stood out most was the care behind the process. Glyn helped us turn an abstract idea around community and connection into a brand that genuinely feels like Hang. We’re incredibly proud of what we built together.
Mark,
CEO, Hang
The system
Created to foster social interaction
The complete brand system operates like the communities it serves, flexible, inclusive, and designed to grow organically. Visual devices can be mixed, matched, and adapted as new communities join the platform, ensuring the brand evolves alongside its users.
The problem isn't simply that people have fewer people around them. We've also lost the places and rituals that made connection happen naturally. The spontaneous conversation, the familiar face at your local spot, the place you could go without needing a reason. We have more ways to reach each other, but fewer reasons to actually be together.
Hang saw an opportunity to reverse the loneliness trend. It is not another digital-first platform, but a tool designed to get people offline and together. The vision is ambitious: create a platform that uses technology to eliminate the need for technology, connecting strangers around shared interests and transforming them into real-world communities.
The brand needed to do something unusual for a social platform: make the digital experience feel secondary. Hang wasn't asking people to spend more time looking at a screen. It was asking them to put the screen down, step outside and meet someone new. That meant the identity had to carry a sense of movement, spontaneity and possibility, while still feeling familiar enough to invite people in.
The challenge was making that transition feel natural. Hang wasn't trying to replace human connection with another interface. It used technology as a bridge to something that happens beyond the screen. From finding people with shared interests to creating moments when strangers become familiar faces, we designed every part of the experience to move people from digital interaction to real-world belonging.
But launching a platform about authentic connection requires authentic branding. We helped them build an identity as diverse and dynamic as the communities they serve. Rather than forcing every community into one visual mould, the identity was designed to have enough flexibility to adapt, move and express itself differently across people, interests and places. The result is a brand that feels social without trying too hard to look "social", energetic without becoming chaotic, and welcoming without losing its distinct character.
Hang achieved this by fostering genuine social connections. That philosophy meant rethinking what social platform branding should look and feel like. Instead of design patterns built to keep people on the platform, we needed to create a desire to leave it. Instead of designing for a specific demographic, we needed to tap into the universal human need for authentic connection. The brand had to feel like an invitation, not an interruption.
The logo's fluid, dynamic form sets the tone for Hang's visual identity. We designed something that could move, adapt and remain recognisable across different contexts. This flexibility reflects the way real communities form and evolve: organically, naturally and without rigid structures.
That same thinking shaped the color system. Hang brings together people across generations, interests and communities, so we built a vibrant 15-colour palette with no single dominant colour. Instead of hierarchy, the system embraces multiplicity, giving different communities the freedom to express themselves in ways that feel natural to them.
The palette isn't just about having more colours. It's about creating room for difference. A book club can feel different from a tech meetup, while still belonging to the same Hang ecosystem. The system gives each community its own expression without losing the identity of the platform.
We carried this idea into the illustration system too. Custom illustrations use a mix of shapes, forms and characters to create a visual language that feels as diverse as the people Hang brings together. They aren't simply decorative. They're another way of making the brand feel open, human and representative of the communities it serves.
At its core, Hang is about creating reasons for people to show up. The brand needed to carry that same invitation. Something that feels alive, open and human, and gives people a sense that there is something waiting for them on the other side of the screen.
Creative Direction
Paul Obayagbona
Brand Design
Paul Obayagbona
Comfort Adetoro
3D
Website Design
Product Design
Akinsehinde Elizabeth
Motion
Paul Obayagbona
