TAKE A NURSE
Author: Mike Pernice, Founder · Last updated: September 2026
Take a Nurse is a nurse-driven, patient-focused small business in Pittsburgh, PA that advocates for independent individuals who need help understanding and navigating their medical care. The Stoop designed its visual identity from the mark up — a logo system built around a stethoscope that forms the N and resolves into a heart, five approved color variants, a seven-color palette, a two-typeface type system, business cards, letterhead, and a brand identity guide — then, once the identity was final, shot the brand film and photography for the new takeanurse.org, which The Stoop is now building on the same system.
The Challenge
Take a Nurse grew out of founder Kathy Fadgen's own experience. Her out-of-town parents were going to medical appointments without her, and unknown treatment plans and medication changes led to stress, delayed care, and unnecessary emergency room visits. The brand had to feel like the service itself — a calm, trusted advocate — and it had to hold up everywhere a healthcare brand shows up: a website header, a business card, an embroidered uniform, a form, a phone screen. It also needed rules so it stays consistent no matter who produces the next piece. The Stoop delivered the full system: the mark, the lockups, the colors, the type, the stationery, and the guide that governs them.
The Logo System
The identity is built around one idea: a stethoscope that draws the N and resolves into a heart. The Stoop delivered it as three lockups — a horizontal default for websites, email headers, and signage; a stacked version for square formats and event graphics; and a standalone logomark for avatars, favicons, and watermarks — each supplied in Primary two-color, Blue, Magenta, Black, and White, with clear-space and minimum-size rules so the mark survives embroidery, vinyl, and small screens.
Need a mark that works on a business card and a building?
Start Your LogoPalette & Type System
Blue carries trust and structure; magenta carries energy and warmth. Care Teal, Warm Gold, Cloud, and Ink support them, each with a defined role and hex, RGB, and CMYK values so print and digital match. Norteans handles headlines and key numbers; Roboto does the reading, with a recommended scale from H1 to captions and a misuse page that protects proportion, color, spacing, and contrast.
#2B3990
#DA1C5C
#147D7A
#F3B63F
#F4F5FA
#231F20
#FFFFFF
Want a palette and type system your whole team can actually follow?
Build Your Brand SystemBusiness Cards & Letterhead
The first pieces built on the system: a two-sided business card that puts the horizontal lockup and magenta accent on the front and the logomark, contact details, and Norteans name treatment on the back, plus a letterhead that carries the header and footer bar onto every printed page.
Need stationery that matches the brand you just built?
Design Your StationeryBrand Film & Photography
With the identity final, the next workstream was content development: the artifacts for the new takeanurse.org, which The Stoop is building for a mid-October launch. On Wednesday, September 16, 2026, a crew of two — Mike producing, Jason on photo and video — shot the brand film and the photography in one four-hour window at the founder’s home, running six scenes in show order: the kitchen-table conversation, the front-door arrival, the drive in the client’s SUV, founder portraits, the phone call and detail inserts, and green-screen clinical plates so clinical settings could be composited without renting a facility. Out of it came a 60-second founder film in Kathy’s own narration, captioned and closing on a “Patient First” end card; a 30-second text-free loop for the website hero; and 1,008 retouched photos, every shot mapped to a page of the new site.
“When someone calls me for the first time, I pause and I hear them out.”
Building a website that needs its own film and photo library?
Plan Your Brand ShootOur Process
The Mark
Designed the stethoscope-and-heart N as the single idea the whole identity hangs on, then set the wordmark around it.
Lockups & Variants
Built horizontal, stacked, and logomark lockups and supplied each in five approved color variants, with clear-space and minimum-size floors.
Color & Type
Defined a seven-color palette with print and digital values, paired Norteans with Roboto, and set a recommended type scale.
Stationery & Guide
Produced print-ready business cards and letterhead, then documented everything in a nine-page brand identity guide.
A System, Not Just a Logo
Take a Nurse now has one mark that scales from a favicon to signage, a palette and type pairing that match across print and screen, stationery ready for the printer, and a guide that lets anyone — a printer, an embroiderer, a web developer — produce on-brand work without rebuilding or guessing. With the identity final, The Stoop shot the brand film and photography in September 2026 — a 60-second founder film, a 30-second website hero loop, and 1,008 retouched photos, every shot mapped to a page of the new takeanurse.org, now in build for a mid-October launch.
Questions About This Project
What did The Stoop design for Take a Nurse? +
A logo system with horizontal, stacked, and logomark lockups in five color variants, a seven-color palette, a Norteans and Roboto type system, business cards, letterhead, and a nine-page brand identity guide, then the content for the new takeanurse.org: a 60-second founder film, a 30-second website hero loop, and 1,008 retouched photos.
Who is Take a Nurse? +
Take a Nurse is a nurse-driven, patient-focused small business in Pittsburgh, PA that advocates for independent individuals who need help understanding and navigating their medical care.
When was the work done? +
The identity was built in August 2026. The brand film and photography were shot in September 2026, once the identity was final, and The Stoop is now building the Take a Nurse website on the same system.
Need a brand that holds up everywhere?
Let's build the whole system, mark to guidelines to brand film.
