Enterprise Design System
FW25 Trend Symposium
Building the visual language that moves 5,000+ colleagues from data to creative conviction.
ROLE
Lead Visual Designer & Design System Owner
SCOPE
Enterprise-wide
20+ Private Label Brands
5,000+ Attendees
SEASONS
36 Symposiums Over 3 Years
PLATFORM
Adobe XD
Premiere Pro
Canva
STATUS
Shipped Live
Adopted Enterprise-Wide
Enterprise Design System
FW25 Trend Symposium
Building the visual language that moves 5,000+ colleagues from data to creative conviction.
ROLE
Lead Visual Designer & Design System Owner
SCOPE
Enterprise-wide
20+ Private Label Brands
5,000+ Attendees
SEASONS
36 Symposiums Over 3 Years
PLATFORM
Adobe XD
Premiere Pro
Canva
STATUS
Shipped Live
Adopted Enterprise-Wide
Enterprise Design System
FW25 Trend Symposium
Building the visual language that moves 5,000+ colleagues from data to creative conviction.
ROLE
Lead Visual Designer & Design System Owner
SCOPE
Enterprise-wide
20+ Private Label Brands
5,000+ Attendees
SEASONS
36 Symposiums Over 3 Years
PLATFORM
Adobe XD
Premiere Pro
Canva
STATUS
Shipped Live
Adopted Enterprise-Wide
01 The Problem
01 The Problem
Twice a year, Macy's Trend Research team had to move 5,000+ colleagues from buyers, fashion designers, merchants, to vendor partners from a blank slate to a shared creative vision for the upcoming season.
The stakes were real. If buyers didn't believe or understand the trend story, they defaulted to historical best-sellers. If designers didn't feel it, the assortments skewed safe and late. The Symposium was the single highest-leverage moment to align creative and commercial teams before a dollar of open-to-buy was committed.
The problem was that the presentation didn't match the ambition of the ideas inside it. The work deserved a visual system that made people feel the trend before they could intellectually process it.
Twice a year, Macy's Trend Research team had to move 5,000+ colleagues from buyers, fashion designers, merchants, to vendor partners from a blank slate to a shared creative vision for the upcoming season.
The stakes were real. If buyers didn't believe or understand the trend story, they defaulted to historical best-sellers. If designers didn't feel it, the assortments skewed safe and late. The Symposium was the single highest-leverage moment to align creative and commercial teams before a dollar of open-to-buy was committed.
The problem was that the presentation didn't match the ambition of the ideas inside it. The work deserved a visual system that made people feel the trend before they could intellectually process it.
02 The System I Built
02 The System I Built
I didn't design a presentation. I designed a system that could produce a presentation — and then scale to every format, every team, and every deadline that followed.
The FW25 Symposium runs on a unified design language: a typographic system pairing editorial display fonts with data-weight body copy, a color architecture built from each season's trend palette, and a spatial logic that lets imagery breathe while keeping information density high enough for merchant audiences.
What the system covers:
Enterprise Symposium decks (the anchor deliverable, 2x per year)
Tentpole trend narratives: one per major seasonal theme
Video productions: 4 per Symposium, produced solo in Premiere Pro and Canva
Templates adopted by Color, Materials, and Artworks teams every season
The templates I built didn't just serve my team. Color, Materials, and Artworks teams pulled them every season to produce their own content — same design language, different subject matter. One system, multiplied across the organization.
I didn't design a presentation. I designed a system that could produce a presentation — and then scale to every format, every team, and every deadline that followed.
The FW25 Symposium runs on a unified design language: a typographic system pairing editorial display fonts with data-weight body copy, a color architecture built from each season's trend palette, and a spatial logic that lets imagery breathe while keeping information density high enough for merchant audiences.
What the system covers:
Enterprise Symposium decks (the anchor deliverable, 2x per year)
Tentpole trend narratives: one per major seasonal theme
Video productions: 4 per Symposium, produced solo in Premiere Pro and Canva
Templates adopted by Color, Materials, and Artworks teams every season
The templates I built didn't just serve my team. Color, Materials, and Artworks teams pulled them every season to produce their own content — same design language, different subject matter. One system, multiplied across the organization.
THE TEMPLATES
THE TEMPLATES
Before – The Shell
One XD source file. Zero layout decisions required of researchers. The template shell built before each season. Pastel gradient placeholders mark open content zones. Structure, hierarchy, and grid are locked. Researchers see exactly where each asset goes — no design decisions required of them.
After – The Finished Presentation
Same structure. Six divisions. Delivered simultaneously. The same file after researchers populate the open zones. Real photography, trend content, editorial imagery. The locked structure held, every slide reads as one cohesive system despite being authored by a team across six divisions simultaneously.
LOGO
LOGO
Star Mark to match Macy's branding | High Contrast Serif |
Built to feel like an editorial institution, not an internal department
Star Mark to match Macy's branding | High Contrast Serif |
Built to feel like an editorial institution, not an internal department
Primary Lockup
Primary Lockup
Default use on all white and light-ground applications for presentations, documents, email headers.
Default use on all white and light-ground applications for presentations, documents, email headers.
Reversed Lockup
Reversed Lockup
For dark-ground applications for video title cards, cover slides, dark email headers.
For dark-ground applications for video title cards, cover slides, dark email headers.
Co-Branded Lockup
Co-Branded Lockup
Used when the TR&F identity appears alongside the Macy's brand — enterprise presentations, internal communications sent to the full organization. The separator rule creates hierarchy without subordinating either mark.
Used when the TR&F identity appears alongside the Macy's brand — enterprise presentations, internal communications sent to the full organization. The separator rule creates hierarchy without subordinating either mark.
Compact + Header Variant
Compact + Header Variant
The mark reduced to 18px height for slide headers, video lower-thirds, and email footers. Even at this size, the star + high-contrast serif remains legible and distinctive. This is the identity's hardest test — and it passes.
The mark reduced to 18px height for slide headers, video lower-thirds, and email footers. Even at this size, the star + high-contrast serif remains legible and distinctive. This is the identity's hardest test — and it passes.
TYPOGRAPHIC SYSTEM
TYPOGRAPHIC SYSTEM
Roslindale
Roslindale
FW25 Symposium
Roslindale Display Narrow Light • Hero Titles, Cover Slides • 120 px
Roslindale Display Narrow Light • Hero Titles, Cover Slides • 120 px
Macro Influences & Aesthetics
Roslindale Display Narrow Light • Section Heading • 70 px
Roslindale Display Narrow Light • Section Heading • 70 px
Q4 Northern Charm
Q4 Northern Charm
Roslindale Display Narrow Light • Section Heading • 55 px
Roslindale Display Narrow Light • Section Heading • 55 px
Why Roslindale?
Why Roslindale?
Ink-trap details give it warmth and editorial authority — the same qualities used by The Atlantic. It signals cultural literacy without feeling fashion-forward in a clichéd way. At display sizes it's confident; at body sizes it's warm. The italic is expressive without being decorative.
Ink-trap details give it warmth and editorial authority — the same qualities used by The Atlantic. It signals cultural literacy without feeling fashion-forward in a clichéd way. At display sizes it's confident; at body sizes it's warm. The italic is expressive without being decorative.
Helvetica Neue
Helvetica Neue
FALL WINTER 2025
Helvetica Neue Bold • Secondary Titles • 50 px
Helvetica Neue Bold • Secondary Titles • 50 px
ENTERPRISE
Helvetica Neue Bold • Header Label • 20 px
Helvetica Neue Bold • Header Label • 20 px
In Fall/Winter 2025, we observe a continuing momentum towards Strategic Imagination, accompanied by a significant shift towards humanizing technology seamlessly into our daily lives.
Helvetica Neue Regular • Body Copy • 16 px
Helvetica Neue Regular • Body Copy • 16 px
BOLD CLASSIC JEWELRY
Helvetica Neue Bold • Caption • 12 px
Helvetica Neue Bold • Caption • 12 px
Why Helvetica Neue?
Why Helvetica Neue?
Helvetica is the invisible workhorse. It creates zero visual noise, so Roslindale and the wordmark can breathe. The pairing works because neither typeface competes for attention. Roslindale handles moments requiring voice and character; Helvetica handles everything requiring clarity and function. Together they create the tension between editorial and utilitarian that defines the TR&F brand.
Helvetica is the invisible workhorse. It creates zero visual noise, so Roslindale and the wordmark can breathe. The pairing works because neither typeface competes for attention. Roslindale handles moments requiring voice and character; Helvetica handles everything requiring clarity and function. Together they create the tension between editorial and utilitarian that defines the TR&F brand.
COMPONENT LIBRARY
SLIDE SYSTEM
COMPONENT LIBRARY
SLIDE SYSTEM
Six component groups. Each group contains template variants for every division. One source file governing all of them.
Six component groups. Each group contains template variants for every division. One source file governing all of them.
TEMPLATES IN USE
TEMPLATES IN USE
Macro Influences & Aesthetics
Macro Influences & Aesthetics
Macro Color
Macro Color
Styling Cues
Styling Cues
Tentpole Trend on a Page
Tentpole Trend on a Page
ONE TENTPOLE. FIVE DIVISIONS. ONE SOURCE FILE.
ONE TENTPOLE. FIVE DIVISIONS. ONE SOURCE FILE.
The same Northern Charm component adapted across four divisions simultaneously — silhouettes, brand recs, and product pools swapped per audience.
The same Northern Charm component adapted across four divisions simultaneously — silhouettes, brand recs, and product pools swapped per audience.
03 The Video Layer
03 The Video Layer
Making buyers feel the trend, not just see it.
Data and imagery alone don't move people. The Symposium videos were built to do something the slides couldn't: create atmosphere. Four videos per Symposium, each one tied to a tentpole trend, produced entirely solo — sourcing footage and photography from across the web, editing in Premiere Pro, building a narrative arc that landed the emotional tone of the trend before the strategic rationale followed.
Making buyers feel the trend, not just see it.
Data and imagery alone don't move people. The Symposium videos were built to do something the slides couldn't: create atmosphere. Four videos per Symposium, each one tied to a tentpole trend, produced entirely solo — sourcing footage and photography from across the web, editing in Premiere Pro, building a narrative arc that landed the emotional tone of the trend before the strategic rationale followed.
NORTHERN CHARM TREND VIDEO
NORTHERN CHARM TREND VIDEO
The Northern Charm video is one of four produced for FW25. It opens the tentpole section, sets the visual world, and gets buyers emotionally invested in a direction before they've seen a single product recommendation.
This wasn't a nice-to-have. Leadership specifically recognized the videos as the element that elevated the Symposium from an informational session to something colleagues looked forward to attending.
The Northern Charm video is one of four produced for FW25. It opens the tentpole section, sets the visual world, and gets buyers emotionally invested in a direction before they've seen a single product recommendation.
This wasn't a nice-to-have. Leadership specifically recognized the videos as the element that elevated the Symposium from an informational session to something colleagues looked forward to attending.
04 The Full Ecosystem
04 The Full Ecosystem
EMAILS
EMAILS
Shareout email was sent to each divisions after the presentation.
Shareout email was sent to each divisions after the presentation.
PRINTED TAKEAWAYS
PRINTED TAKEAWAYS
A seasonal guide developed within the TR&F identity system to give merchants and private brand fashion designers a physical reference they could carry from the Symposium to the sales floor.
A seasonal guide developed within the TR&F identity system to give merchants and private brand fashion designers a physical reference they could carry from the Symposium to the sales floor.
05 The Impact
05 The Impact
$M+
Inventory Decisions per season
ran through this system. The Symposium was how Macy's buying teams moved from trend intuition to category commitment
36 Symposiums
produced over 3 years across 6 divisions — Enterprise, Womenswear, Menswear, Kidswear, Home, and Market Partners
5,000+
colleagues and vendor partners reached per season
20+ Private Label Brands
aligned to a single seasonal vision
3 Cross-Functional Teams
Color, Materials, Artworks adopted templates for their own seasonal content every season
1 Design System
scaled across 6 distinct audience contexts without redesigning from scratch
Leadership Recognition
for elevated design quality that made complex trend intelligence legible and actionable
"I always feel inspired by the Trends — it makes me ready to bring that direction to life for customers on the sales floor."
"I always feel inspired by the Trends — it makes me ready to bring that direction to life for customers on the sales floor."
– Merchant • End User
"The designs really helped reach ideas to the partners. I heard so many compliments from buyers and vendors that these presentations help drive business conversations, and the design's really elevated it."
– Trend Director • Main Collaborator
06 Reflection
06 Reflection
The design work that taught me what systems are actually for.
Building this system over three years taught me something I now apply to every product I design: the deliverable isn't the point. The point is what the deliverable makes possible.
The Symposium deck made it possible for a buyer to say yes to a trend they couldn't yet see on the sales floor. The template made it possible for three other teams to produce content in a fraction of the time. The video made it possible for 5,000 people to walk into a room already believing.
That's what a design system does when it works. It doesn't just make things look consistent. It makes other people's work faster, clearer, and more confident.
That's the design thinking I brought to TrendLens.
The design work that taught me what systems are actually for.
Building this system over three years taught me something I now apply to every product I design: the deliverable isn't the point. The point is what the deliverable makes possible.
The Symposium deck made it possible for a buyer to say yes to a trend they couldn't yet see on the sales floor. The template made it possible for three other teams to produce content in a fraction of the time. The video made it possible for 5,000 people to walk into a room already believing.
That's what a design system does when it works. It doesn't just make things look consistent. It makes other people's work faster, clearer, and more confident.
That's the design thinking I brought to TrendLens.
Cynthia Rhee
©
2026