In one of Hillsdale Homecoming’s more artistic competitions, the banners of Off-Campus Coalition, the Bloc, and Whit-Wat-Way took the top three spots. The creative process used inspiration drawn from the 1950s, in line with the overarching “Through the Decades” homecoming theme.

OCC’s banner was based on the golden age of Hollywood and Western movies.

“I love the graphic design of the ’50s because everything’s so iconic,” senior and banner designer Hannah Cheng said. “Westerns were a huge thing in the ’50s and we wanted to incorporate Hillsdale’s mascot, so we made a movie poster.”

The banner features Associate Dean of Men Jeffery “Chief” Rogers on a horse and used ’50s-style typography. 

“I was thinking about iconic Hillsdale people and thought that Chief would love to be on a horse with a pistol. It just fit perfectly,” Cheng said. “The brush-lettering and angular exclamation points are part of a very distinctive visual style. It feels like it’s from another time.”

Using acrylic paint and permanent markers, about 10 OCC members constructed the banner over two weekends of painting.

“AJ Freeland, a senior and veteran banner painter, led the painting,” said Cheng. “Anyone can fill in lines, but an incorrect color throws off the entire banner.”

Freeland also wrote the names of everyone who contributed to the banner in the upper left-hand corner. 

“We were lucky because we had a lot of people that are looking forward and are kind of driven and independent but also want to enjoy the life that we have at Hillsdale now,” said Cheng. “We’re not in a dorm, there are no resident assistants. We’re actually sacrificing time that could be going to school or a career but instead we worked on the banner.”

The Bloc poster also drew inspiration from the movie posters of the ’50s. 

“We went with a movie poster design where we adapted ‘Singing in the Rain’ to be in Hillsdale,” said senior and banner designer Emily Brausch. “We wanted to personalize the banner to Hillsdale, and it’s always fun to see everyone’s takes on the same theme.”

Brausch inserted Hillsdale College President Larry Arnn’s face in place of Jean Kelly and replaced the original lamp post with the quad fountain. She spent three hours in Photoshop designing the banner. 

Senior and head resident assistant Kate Lawson led a five-person team through 20-30 hours of acrylic painting. 

“My favorite part was when I would paint, and people would stop by and say hello,” Brausch said. “The positive feedback was very encouraging and made me feel like I was contributing something to our homecoming group.”

Brausch said she was surprised to see the Bloc place in the competition. 

“When all of the banners dropped, I saw so many good banners,” said Brausch. “I think that we did a really good job this year.”

Whit-Wat-Way’s banner was based off of Queen Elizabeth II’s coronation portrait.

Senior Colman Rowan said the sheets provided by Student Activities Board were absorbent enough to make precision challenging.

“The banner’s execution was very good,” Rowan said. “It was very technically accurate.”

In his first year working on a banner, Rowan focused primarily on the background of Whit-Wat-Way’s banner. The 11-person painting team put brush to canvas a couple of days before banner drop and spent a full day working on it. 

“I wanted to help with homecoming, and couldn’t do Mock Rock, but I like to paint,” said Rowan. “I was very happy to have an excuse to do that.”