At a Glance

Design, illustration and web development of the English and Japanese bilingual Global Leaders Program website for Hitotsubashi University in Tokyo.

Hitotsubashi is considered one of the most prestigious universities and the best in economics and commerce related subjects in Japan, consistently ranking amongst the top universities in Japanese university rankings.
– Wikipedia

In Detail

The Faculty of Social Sciences, Hitotsubashi University approached us to design and develop a website for their new Global Leaders Program.

Established in 2017, the Faculty of Social Sciences Global Leaders Program (GLP) is an English-based program that seeks to foster students equipped with the skills to thrive and succeed in a global society.

The Global Leaders Program (GLP) is a program for students who wish to globalize their education by taking more courses in English as well as other languages and spend a semester abroad. The Faculty of Social Sciences prioritizes independent and creative thinking, and strive to foster students who are inquisitive, well-informed, and eager to try new challenges.

The new GLP website is also meant to be a platform for students to contribute and publish articles about experiences locally and abroad.

Information Architecture & UI Design

One of our first tasks was to work through the content structure of the sitemap and assign a template to each type of page. We then proceeded to the information architecture of each template as simplified wireframe graphics. Following this 3x design style samples were offered to the client ranging from conservative to modern. Each style sample used slightly different layout, fonts, and colors. The client picked the middle-of-the-road version. The design style was then applied to all templates for desktop, tablet, and mobile screens.

Key Visual Concept

Additionally, the client requested a visual concept to better engage the student target group. We created 4 moodboards with various visual focus ideas ranging from Mail, Travel, Destinations, Japanese Symbols abroad to Study Abroad. Eventually, a mix of the Travel and Destinations topic was used, resulting in fun luggage tags with custom illustrated landmark icons of various countries. The luggage tags playfully break up the layout sections on the homepage.

Web Development

The responsive website design was implemented with multilingual English and Japanese setup to attract both foreign and Japanese students at Hitotsubashi University in Tokyo, Japan. The site was thoroughly cross-browser and cross-device tested before site data was passed on to the client for final content input.

We are very happy with the work that Bento Graphics has done for us. They took into consideration our needs and aims, and came up with a website that was fresh and fun, and which our students find very appealing. Communication was great, and the Skype sessions were also very helpful. I highly recommend their services.

– Sonja Pei-Fen Dale, Adjunct Assistant Professor, Hitotsubashi University