Badge design// A collective goal// Graphic Design

Stay@Home started as an idea for our local Scouting group. (Of which I'm also part.) During the Corona virus (COVID-19) outbreak of 2019/2020, many measures were taken to try and curb the spread of the virus. One of those measures included the banning of all Scouting-related activities. Everyone was expected to stay home and avoid crowds. Since Scouting includes a lot of physical contact, all activities were halted.

We didn't want our Scouts to become bored at home, we wanted them to still have something to do, something Scouting-related, if possible. That's why we created the Stay@Home initiative. Stay@Home consists of a series of challenges, challenges that the children can complete whenever they want throughout the week. Those challenges can be anything, from "Do a dab" to "Make a bridge out of paper, make it as strong as possible. (Bonus points if you can stand on it!)". They can send the videos and photos in through a WhatsApp group we created. Every Saturday we, their Scout leaders, will be available from 10am to 12pm to grade their challenges.

As an extra incentive, I was asked to design a badge for the Scouts to earn. The badge will commemorate the extremely unique times we experienced but also of course the fun we had with the Stay@Home Challenges. We decided to share our Stay@Home challenge and the Stay@Home badge on the public Scouting The Netherlands Facebook page so that we could make a mass-order for the badge. Within the first 24 hours we had a total of 800+ badges ordered. Click here to check the Facebook page.

Since the first badge, two more badges had been requested by Scouting The Netherlands which are now for sale on www.scoutshop.nl. The first one was the Stay@Home 2021 badge, since Scouting was still forced to hold their meetings online in 2021. The second one is the Naar Buiten 2021 badge, loosely translating to "Back outside 2021", since some activities were allowed to be held outside again. Both badges commemorate the 2019-2020-2021 COVID-19 outbreak in their own way.

The first sketches included a Scouting-related scene with a tent and a night sky. The scene is happening behind a closed window since you're expected to Stay@Home. I found it to be slightly confusing as it also looked like a campsite scene, and the Stay@Home activities aren't camp-related activities.