Plant Themed Crosswalks

During my internship at the Missouri Botanical Garden, the long term project of repaving and creating new signage for the public parking lot was reaching it's final stages. The time for repainting the pedestrian crosswalks in front of the visitor center was approaching, and the desire for a fun and themed crosswalk had been discussed several times in the past. Elaborate pitches for murals as crosswalks had been rejected by the project committee and it became my job during my internship to design additional options for the committee to review that were simpler with less reliance on perspective of the viewer.

My simplest generic leaf design was what was picked, it is presented below. Along with some of my other mock ups to show the variety presented to the committee. The intern the following semester added the side bars to my mock up to create a final product that blended into the long expanses of traditional crossings elsewhere on the visitor's parking lot.

Below are some of unused mock ups I created for the project, the main goal was to create simple graphic plant shapes that would imitate stripes. The banana leaf was chosen and given final tweaks to more closely resemble the oak leaf arrangements after my semester had ended, by a following intern, but I did create the overall designs in a similar fashion to the existing crosswalk. Giving the following intern their starting point.

Banana Leaves, mock up. Illustrator shapes over picture.

Falling Leaves, mock up. Illustrator shapes over picture.

Winding Vines, mock up. Illustrator shapes over picture.

Trellis Vines, mock up. Illustrator shapes over picture.

Trellis Roses, mock up. Illustrator shapes over picture.

The figures for scale and fun are provided courtesy of my parents; they took this completely seriously....
You can walk on these crosswalks yourself by visiting their real-life location at the entrance of the Missouri Botanical Garden's Ridgeway Visitor's Center. They are pretty neat.

To learn more about the Missouri Botanical Garden please visit them at www.mobot.org.