Meet Helen

Helen is a 90 year old widow from Pewamo, Michigan. Helen loves to bird watch, talk with her kids, and go on short walks up and down the driveway. She has three children, all married and living out of state, but has siblings, nieces and nephews who live in the area.

Physically, Helen is in wonderful shape. However, she has the early stages of dementia and frequently forgets things she did throughout the day. She’s on Medicare for her health insurance. Helen recently started receiving Meals on Wheels because she forgot to turn off the stove; it was accidentally left on for a few days. Helen remembers her age using number blocks on her counter that say “90.” She can no longer drive due to her age and must rely on other people to get her groceries, go to doctor’s appointments, and go to mass when she feels up to it. Her way of keeping up with local events is reading the weekly parish bulletin.

In the small town of Pewamo, there are many seniors just like Helen. They’re struggling with daily tasks while living on their own, but they don’t want to leave their hometown. Ninety-six percent of these seniors rely on Medicare; unfortunately, it does not cover the cost of assisted living, which would benefit these seniors in the Pewamo area.

In order to combat this issue, I created Living Lily, a free assisted living facility for those who need it most.

Finding Funding

Living Lily is funded by St. Joesph Catholic Church. This is because around 90% of Pewamo’s residents are Catholic and are members of this parish.

Based on primary research, seniors in the area would be more likely to live in an assisted living facility if it were associated with the church; the facility would be based off the church’s teachings, which is a large part of these seniors’ lives. In addition, there could very easily be a chapel within the building, where the priest at St. Joseph's could come say mass once a week.

Secondary research shows that there is a connection between a person’s beliefs and their well being. Positive beliefs, comfort, and strength gained from religion, meditation, and prayer can promote healing and may help seniors in assisted living feel better physically. Positive beliefs may also prevent health problems and help seniors better cope with illness, stress, or death.

Creating a Catholic assisted living facility in the Pewamo area would not only help the funding of the program, but also help the physical and mental wellbeing of the senior residents as well.

Meet Joyce

Joyce is Helen’s daughter. She is 62 years old and has been married to her husband for 40 years. She has 2 adult children and 5 grandchildren. Her faith is very important to her, especially when it comes to decision making.

Joyce doesn’t know enough about technology to want to buy a desktop or laptop computer, but her daughter convinced her to buy a tablet a few years ago. This is what she primarily uses to research and find things online.

With Joyce in mind, I created the interface for Living Lily.

Social Media

Social media is essential for Living Lily, as it’s a form of free advertising and can be simply an extension of the website, making it more accessible for users.

Facebook is the most common social media platform for users like Joyce, as 65% of her age demographic have a Facebook account. The next nearest platform is Pinterest, with only 27% of the “baby boomer” generation having an account.

The page gives updates on what seniors are up to and some fun tasks that community members can volunteer for. These give those looking for an assisted living facility an idea of day-to-day tasks, as well as invite possible volunteers to the facility. Though following St. Joseph parish and school on Facebook, parishioners can be recommended the Living Lily page, which further spreads Living Lily’s brand. The page would be run by volunteers at Living Lily.

Meet Dylan

Dylan is a 17 year old high schooler. He participates in high school cross country and track and is a member of the National Honors Society. He’s also an active member of St. Joesph Catholic Church. For his community service hours, Dylan volunteers at Living Lily. He helps organize activities, posts on the Facebook page, and works as a receptionist.

When volunteering, Dylan wears this tshirt and name tag. They help separate him as a volunteer instead of a visitor, and the name tag helps residents who may not remember his name due to gaps between his volunteering times.

When volunteering as a receptionist, Dylan works with the facility’s stationery, such as writing thank you cards to donors. Because Living Lily is a non-profit, the primary focus of the stationery is to be very budget-friendly but also reflect the brand.

The thank you cards, to be sent to donors, are only printed on one side, leaving the interior blank for a hand-written message.
The business cards on the right are also one-sided, which significantly reduces printing costs.
The letterhead only uses two colors of ink and can be easily made into a MicrosoftWord template. This allows Living Lily to print letters on their personal printer only when they need one. The same idea applies to the envelope; blank envelopes can be purchased in a larger quantity, making them cheaper. The design on the envelope is only one sided, so when an envelope is needed, Living Lily employees can simply print the design themselves on their printer.
All of the stationery is on white paper, which also lowers the cost.

Helen, along with many other seniors in the town of Pewamo, does not have access to the internet. Therefore, I needed to create a way to reach out to seniors in a non-digital format.

The best and most direct option would be to place a flyer in the St. Joesph bulletin, which Helen reads every week to get parish updates. Putting an insert in the bulletin is also completely free, which helps cut down on costs.

The flyer gives basic information on the facility, as well as a phone number to call for more information.

This is the outdoor signage for Living Lily’s facility. The brick and style of sign matches the brick on St. Joseph’s school, rectory, and on the church.

Moving Forward

In the future, I plan on extending the stationery and developing numerous forms for information such as logging volunteer hours, volunteer background history, residents' medical history, and future doctors appointments. These would be offered online and on paper, and the user can choose which format they prefer. I will also be creating and designing an exterior of the building as an extension of the exterior touch points.