MadChilly
built on sand, not hype.
Project Overview
MadChilly is a real athletic apparel brand I'm building, not a school project or a design exercise — it launches with shorts made for beach volleyball, the sport that got me into design in the first place.
The plan isn't to launch a full catalog on day one. Beach volleyball comes first, running next, soccer after that — each step adding to the brand rather than replacing what came before. It's meant to feel like a brand building momentum, not a finished product line.
The reference point is underground street soccer culture — raw locations, community over hype, creative expression that doesn't need a stage — but dialed toward chill and understated rather than extreme. The quality and the play carry the message; the brand doesn't need to shout about it.
Process
-
01
The Spark
MadChilly didn't start as a business plan — it started on the sand. Beach volleyball was the first sport that got me obsessive over how gear looked as much as how it played, and at some point that turned into sketching my own logo instead of just wearing someone else's.
-
02
First Mark
The very first MadChilly mark took about five minutes to sketch — a stylized owl-meets-fox "M" built in Illustrator before there was anything resembling a business plan behind it. It's still a genuinely solid mark on its own; it just ended up getting applied to the wrong products first.
V1 — five-minute icon sketch
-
03
First Direction: Outdoor Gear
With a logo in hand, the earliest full concept went outdoor and mountaineering — backpacks, cold-weather layers, a "gear for the next adventure" web and app mockup, even an out-of-home poster. It looked sharp as a brand board, but none of it actually connected to beach volleyball, the sport that started this whole thing.
V1 direction — outdoor/mountaineering concept, shelved
-
04
Early UI/UX: The E-Commerce Concept
Alongside the outdoor-gear direction, I mocked up what an actual MadChilly site and app could look like — a "Gear for the Next Adventure" landing page, a shop grid with the graffiti-style wordmark, and a full product detail page for a TrueWarmth longsleeve, sizes and price included. None of it shipped, but the emphasis on movement and an editorial grid over a typical e-commerce layout carried forward into the identity work that followed.
V1 direction — original e-commerce UI/UX concept, shelved
-
05
The Pivot
Cutting the outdoor gear meant cutting the icon and the site concept that came with it. What replaced it was a bold, hand-styled "MADCHILLY" wordmark applied straight to real product — first as a print on actual beach volleyball shorts, tested and worn by real friends on real sand instead of staying a mockup.
V2 — hand-styled wordmark, current direction
-
06
Fabric, Fit & Function
The fabric and fit calls weren't guesswork. An internship at Shirts & Skins, a basketball apparel manufacturer outside Portland, is where I actually learned how fabric and manufacturing work — and that went straight into these shorts, starting with a 4-way stretch fabric for range of motion during dives and serves. Inseam length went through real testing: I started betting on a baggier 7", thinking that look was coming back, but talking to actual beach volleyball players showed a lot of them wanted the shorter 5" instead. We ended up offering both, and both sold. The pocket bags are curved instead of square, so sand doesn't collect in the corners and they sit more comfortably against the leg, and they zip closed to keep your stuff secure and sand out while you're playing. The curved cut at the hem is a smaller detail on top, but it's what gives the leg opening its shape.
-
07
Building the System
From there it stopped being about a single logo and started being about a system. The vibe words, palette, and roadmap below are the parts of that system that exist so far — this page will keep growing alongside the brand as it does.