CHARI®WORKPLAY



Hello!

I’m Aishwarya Chari, a graphic designer and illustrator drawn to projects where research, narrative, and material exploration overlap. My practice moves between brand identity, editorial systems, packaging, and quietly odd personal work—paintings, hand-made crafts, and experiments with food, textiles, and found materials.

I’m interested in how place, memory, and everyday ingredients can shape visual systems, whether that’s through a slow, coastal magazine about Goa or a dashboard of data about what we eat. When I’m not designing, you’ll usually find me cooking, testing recipes, or making a mess with new tools and surfaces—all part of the same ongoing attempt to listen closely, then translate what I learn into thoughtful, grounded design.


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ABOUT




Education
Maryland Institute
College of Art

Graphic Design MFA
Baltimore 2026


Indian Institute of Technology
UX Design and Technology
Hyderabad, India 2024

MIT Institute of Design
Bachelor of Design
Pune, India 2021






Employment Maryland Institute
College of Art

Graduate Intern
Baltimore, USA
2024-2026

Beanly Coffee
Senior Graphic Designer
Delhi,India
2022-2024

MyMuse Wellness
Graphic Designer
Mumbai,India
2022

Sleepy Owl Coffee
Full Time Designer
Delhi,India
2021-2022

Eureka Moments
Graphic Design Intern Mumbai,India
2021

Clay Studio
Design Intern
Mumbai, India
2019




Skills
Brand identity systems, packaging design (CPG, F&B), design systems & guidelines, 360 campaign systems, typographic storytelling & layout, environmental and experiential design,, UX‑informed visual design.  

Tools: InDesign, Illustrator, Photoshop, Figma, After Effects, Premiere Pro, Cavalry, Procreate, AI-assisted image and motion exploration.


Tools
InDesign, Illustrator, Photoshop, Figma, After Effects, Premiere Pro, Cavalry, Procreate, AI-assisted image and motion exploration.





AwardsKnots - Balloon Sculpting
Kit Brand Identity
Communication Arts Awards 2025
Brand and Identity - Runner-Up






Last Updated 03.05.26








Kokum


An identity and editorial project inspired by Goa’s duality—tradition and modernity, calm and chaos. The design draws on Azulejo tiles, coastal textures, and regional colour palettes to create a grounded yet expressive visual system. Through typography and storytelling, the magazine captures the layered voices and evolving spirit of Goa, offering a thoughtful, place-based reading experience.




Logomark


In the Kokum logomark, an upside-down ‘Q’ from Coffo Raffine is reimagined as the kokum fruit, its curved counter and extended tail suggesting the fruit’s body and stem. This simple typographic shift roots the wordmark in Goa’s native ingredient, quietly foregrounding the magazine’s focus on place, flavour, and regional storytelling.





























Year
2026
Mentor
Jeff Glendednnings
Category
Editorial Design
Identity System
Typography
Storytelling
Overview
Kokum Magazine is an identity and editorial project shaped by Goa’s built-in dualities—tradition and modernity, calm and chaos, locals and visitors. Drawing from Azulejo tiles, coastal textures, and regional color palettes, the magazine builds a grounded yet expressive visual system that feels unmistakably tied to place. Through layered typography, photography, and narrative structure, Kokum becomes a space where recipes, essays, and visual stories sit side by side, capturing the evolving spirit of Goa beyond postcard clichés.


Challenge
How do you design for a place that is often flattened into a single tourist image and instead reveal its complexity and contradictions? The identity needed to honor local references without sliding into pastiche, balance quiet, archival moments with loud, energetic ones, and support a reading experience that feels both reflective and alive.


Solution
The visual system pairs grid-driven layouts with intentional breaks—tilted frames, overlapping type, and shifting scales—to echo Goa’s rhythm of order and interruption. Motifs inspired by Azulejo tiles (portuguese architecture influence) and coastal details are reinterpreted as flexible graphic elements, while a warm, editorial typographic palette allows different voices to coexist on the page. The result is a magazine that reads as both document and love letter: a thoughtful, place-based publication where Goa’s many moods can unfold at their own pace.