Spotify Waves. Mindfulness. Anytime, anywhere. 

Spotify Waves exists within Spotify’s navigation bar to differentiate our product features and service. Our mission is to promote healing and mental wellbeing with access to positive sounds and to normalize taking care of your mental health.

In an increasingly chaotic world, mental wellness is rarely taught and often ignored. Smart phones, social media, and “always-on” culture have contributed to what is now a global mental health crisis. Even worse, the stigma surrounding these issues, the lack of accessibility, and the high cost of treatment keeps many people from seeking help.

Our goal is to bring wisdom and mindfulness to Spotify’s 200M+ worldwide users with scientifically proven technology. We strive to normalize mental and emotional wellness by putting life-saving mindfulness tools right into our users’ pockets. We believe deeply that everyone deserves the opportunity to learn, cope, and thrive without additional cost.

Every human is a cultural artifact, consisting of memories and experiences. Sounds are deeply tied to these emotions. Spotify Waves leverages the scientific power of sound to activate the human subconscious, opening the portal to resonant and profoundly effective changes within the mind and body.

“Neuroscience research shows that few psychological problems are the results of defects of understanding; most originate in pressures from deeper regions in the brain.”

Bessel Van Der Kolk, M.D., The Body Keeps the Score

Why is sound so important?

“Being able to hover calmly and objectively over our thoughts, feelings, and emotions and then take our time to respond allows the executive brain to inhibit, organize, and modulate the hardwired automatic reactions preprogrammed into the emotional brain. This capacity is crucial for preserving our relationships with our fellow human beings.”

Bessel Van Der Kolk, M.D., The Body Keeps the Score

Proof of Concept

Branding

We have stylized and abstracted the Spotify logo to resemble a sound wave. The original sketch represents our thought process in transforming the subspace within Spotify into a differentiated feature. The process of logo exploration is what revealed our need for an icon to represent this module versus a differentiated logo.

Waves’ color identity system will create a gentle transition from the traditional layout into a more mindful space. Recognizable iconography will draw users towards the WAVES feature and encourage daily use.

We will initially use Spotify’s colors to establish WAVES as a sub-brand until our product gains market traction and brand awareness. Our Waves colors will ultimately be used to represent a separate, more serene digital habitat on the app. The chosen color palette is intended to ease our users into a more tranquil headspace. Purple is connected to power, wisdom, and spirituality, and differentiation. Blue represents peace, security, and order.

Ad Campaign

We chose to advertise OOH where people find themselves "waiting" or in transition (like bus stations and heavily trafficked urban pedestrian paths) and during times when they would be most likely to already have headphones in order to inspire exploration of Spotify's mindfulness subspace.