Work Vanessa’s Place
Transport Accident Commission · Road safetySix road-safety themes, built for the phone in a pocket
Vanessa’s Place is the TAC’s road-safety platform for young Victorians: a house on the festival circuit, a social presence, and a website. In 2025 the TAC asked Ladoo to rebuild the site on Squiz for the refreshed brand, for an audience of 18 to 25 year olds who arrive from social on their phones and leave within a minute. It had to be clear, direct and non-judgmental, and simple for the TAC team to keep fresh.
- Six road-safety theme pages built from short-form modules
- Instagram and TikTok video inside the pages, with share and follow prompts
- WCAG 2.2 AA on an animated brand, with campaign GIFs added in 2026
Meet them where they are, and get out of the way
The TAC was clear about who the site was for and how they would arrive. Young people, on a phone, from a TikTok or an Instagram post, wanting the facts on one thing: tonight’s drive home. The brief asked for a mobile-first site with short-form content, five to seven priority road-safety behaviours presented clearly, video from the social accounts inside the pages, forms for competitions and surveys, and a tone that is friendly, factual and part of a collective rather than a lecture.
It also had to carry a new brand: bright, high-contrast colour, clear type, animation and a cast of characters. And it had to be easy for the TAC team to edit in Squiz, so a campaign could go up without a developer. Ladoo proposed a ten-week programme from discovery to launch, and delivered it on Squiz Matrix.
18 to 25, on a phone, from social
They do not browse. They tap a link, read a fact or two, maybe enter a competition, and go. The site had to answer in seconds, in their language, without judgement.
- One tap from the home page to any theme
- Facts as cards you flick through, not paragraphs
- Share with a mate and follow on socials, built in
Campaigns that change every season
Vanessa’s Place travels to festivals and runs competitions, so the site has to keep up. Authors needed templates they could fill and forms they could stand up themselves.
- Theme pages built from modules in Squiz
- Competition and survey forms that export to a spreadsheet
- A contact form with extra fields and a security check
Every theme page answers the same question
What do I need to know before I drive tonight? Each theme opens with a line in the brand’s voice, then a row of quick facts to flick through, an animated character, and a prompt to share it. The same template carries all six, so a new theme is a content job, not a design job.
Pick a theme. It cycles on its own until you do.
What a theme page has to carry
Short-form does not mean thin. A theme page holds the facts, the brand, the social video and the prompts, and still reads in under a minute. This is the speeding page.
12345- 1
The theme, in the brand’s type
A heavy condensed heading in Vanessa’s blue, with a highlight strip where the brand wants a punchline.
- 2
One honest paragraph
The intro is written for the audience: what speeding does to a crash, in plain words, with no lecture attached.
- 3
Quick facts you flick through
Tilted red cards that scroll sideways, each one a single fact. On a phone they swipe. Authors add a card by adding a module.
- 4
The character
Each theme has one: a speeding car, a drink-driving D, a phone that will not be disturbed. In 2026 the social campaign’s animated GIFs joined the theme pages through a component authors can reuse anywhere.
- 5
Share it, follow it
Send this to a mate and the Instagram and TikTok links sit at the end of every page, with the Powered by TAC mark.
Three characters that do the talking
The campaign’s animated characters came from the TAC’s social channels. In March 2026 Ladoo put them on the theme pages: optimised for the web, placed through a component authors can reuse on any theme, and tested across browsers and screen sizes. Hover one.
Designed on the phone, then let out
The brief said mobile first and meant it, so the home page was designed at phone size before anything else: the house, the line, six big red buttons, about and contact. On a tablet the buttons go to two columns and the festival photos come in at the sides. On a laptop they frame the page.
The same home page, captured today at three widths. Nothing is hidden on the phone that a laptop gets to see.
Pick a screen. It cycles on its own until you do.
Thinking about something similar? Nathan reads every message and replies within a business day.Talk to Ladoo
The kit the TAC team builds pages from
The brief listed the features. Ladoo built each one as a module in Squiz with a defined content structure, so authors fill in fields and the design takes care of itself.
One fact per card
A row of cards that scroll sideways. Add a module, add a fact. The tilt and the type come with it.
Instagram and TikTok, in the page
Video from the Vanessa’s Place accounts embedded where the content is, so the site and the socials tell one story.
Forms that export themselves
A form template for consumer promotions and surveys, with entries exported to a spreadsheet, and a terms and conditions page to go with it.
Share with a mate
Prompts to send a page to a friend or follow on socials, and a contact form with the extra fields the TAC needs and a security check.
A brand that shouts, on a site that still passes
The brand guidelines asked for clear visuals, bright and high-contrast colour, clear fonts and animation. Ladoo built the design system around them: cream pages, the red of the fact cards, the blue of the headings, a heavy condensed display face, and the characters in motion. Every combination was checked for contrast, so the site meets WCAG 2.2 AA without toning the brand down.
The voice of a mate who knows the facts, not a department.
Vanessa’s Place is a place people go, at festivals and online.
Facts about what happens, never a wagging finger.
Real numbers about speed, fatigue, drugs and drink.
A campaign site that keeps moving
Vanessa’s Place runs on a festival calendar and a social calendar, and the site follows both. Ladoo supports it through a support pack.
The proposal
A ten-week programme: discovery and ideation, design and definition, delivery and deployment, with the TAC supplying the content and the brand.
The work order
Signed, and the site built in two-week iterations on Squiz Matrix with a 90-day warranty after launch.
Launch
Six theme pages, about and contact, forms, social video, keyword search, and connections to Google Analytics and the TAC’s own sites.
Animated GIFs
Three GIFs from the social campaign added to three theme pages (speeding, distractions, drink driving), optimised for the web, and a component so authors can put them on any theme without a developer.
Six layers, one team
Every public website is a stack. These are the layers Ladoo designed and built for Vanessa’s Place, from the red card a thumb flicks to the spreadsheet a competition entry lands in.
From the card a thumb flicks to the spreadsheet an entry lands in.Designed and built by one Ladoo team on Squiz Matrix
- InterfaceMobile-first templates for six road-safety themes, the about page and contact
- ContentShort-form modules: quick facts, competition promotions and calls to action, no long pages
- SocialInstagram and TikTok video inside the pages, and share-with-a-mate prompts
- FormsCompetition entries and surveys that export to a spreadsheet; a contact form with a security check
- AccessibilityWCAG 2.2 AA on a loud, animated brand
- MeasurementGoogle Analytics, keyword search and links to the TAC and How Safe Is Your Car sites
Ten weeks, four stages
Discovery and ideation
Background research, a review of the previous site and its content, a peer review of sites with a similar style and tone, and consultation with the TAC team on direction and assets.
Design and definition
The information architecture, high-fidelity wireframes for the home page and a theme page, design concepts in the new brand, then the design system: the grid, the colour and type, and the modules.
Delivery
Mobile-first templates and interactions, responsive front end, Squiz Matrix implementation, the forms and social embeds, and a limited set of content loaded to prove the modules.
Deployment
Testing and quality assurance against WCAG 2.2 AA, a training session for the TAC’s site administrators, the go-live checklist, and support through launch and beyond.
The questions we get asked about this project
Did Ladoo write the content?
No. The TAC wrote the facts and the voice, and its creative agency supplied the character animations. Ladoo designed and built the site they go into, and loaded enough content to prove every module before handing over.
Where does the video come from?
From the Vanessa’s Place Instagram and TikTok accounts. The pages embed it rather than hosting a copy, so the site shows what the socials show.
Can the TAC team add a theme?
Yes. The six themes share one template built from modules, so a seventh is a page of content in Squiz: a heading, an intro, a row of fact cards and a character.
Would this work for us?
If you run a campaign aimed at people who arrive from social, read for a minute and leave, and you need a site your own team can refresh every season, this is the shape. Talk to Nathan and he will tell you honestly.
- Client
- Transport Accident Commission
- Site
- vanessasplace.com.au
- Sector
- Road safety
- Platform
- Squiz Matrix
- What we did
Ladoo ran discovery, designed the structure and the interface, built the site on Squiz Matrix and trained the TAC’s administrators. The TAC owns the content and the brand, and Ladoo supports the site through a support pack.
What shipped
- A mobile-first site on Squiz Matrix for six road-safety themes, about and contact
- One theme template built from short-form modules: quick facts, promotions, calls to action
- Instagram and TikTok video inside the pages, with share-with-a-mate and follow prompts
- Competition and survey forms that export to a spreadsheet, with a terms and conditions page
- WCAG 2.2 AA on the new brand, with Google Analytics and links to the TAC sites
- Animated GIFs from the social campaign on the theme pages in 2026, through a reusable component
Talk to Nathan about your site.
Nathan runs Ladoo and reads every message himself. Tell him what the site has to do and what is in the way, and within a business day he will tell you what he would do first and whether we are the right fit.