Work

Caran d'Ache

2015 marked the 100th anniversary of Caran d’Ache, a Swiss favorite known worldwide, for school, office, art, and luxury writing supplies. In recognition of this momentous occasion, Base was tasked with concentrating its brand around a central identity that is unique, meaningful, and firmly rooted in its history. We created a new logotype and a custom typeface that pays tribute to the foundation story of the company and serves as a link between the departments of Haute Écriture, Office, and Colors of Caran d’Ache. The renewed identity serves as the foundation for implementing the company’s global development strategy.

Caran d’Ache writes its own story

Clarifying Vision

Brand Identity

Brand Strategy

Typeface Design

BVN is a creative collective of architects, designers, researchers and makers with offices in Sydney, Brisbane, London and New York. Connected by a shared vision for a better planet, passionate about problems and bold about solutions, they are simultaneously globally-minded and people-focused. It’s these ideas that underpin their new brand identity.
Using the logotype as point of departure we reimagined their new brand identity as an atom from which a comprehensive visual system evolved – from a custom variable typeface, iconographic library, information graphics system, and beyond. All starting from the idea of an open box. This systems based approach provided BVN not just a powerful toolkit to showcase their work, but a means of celebrating work in process and speculative moonshot ideas, not just the final outcome. Thus solving a critical challenge when it comes to showcasing their large scale and complex work – that completed projects today were often designed 5+ years ago!
Architectural storytelling all too often considers other architects as the primary (or sole) audience. Not BVN. By employing a clearer and more conversational tone of voice, and showcasing projects didactically, BVN’s ninety plus years of experience is made accessible to the broadest possible audience. Welcoming the industry professional, prospective commissioner, student, or enthusiast equally.
Architecture as a profession is genuinely multi-authored, it’s also pretty messy and iterative (shaping the future always is). Collectively we chose to embrace these truths and showcase BVN’s work and internal culture honestly, from a documentary perspective. BVN as a practice operating in the world at large, and BVN under the hood. The result is a bright and exciting portrayal of practice as laboratory, and built environment as mise-en-scène. 
Bringing it all together is the BVN website, the culmination of almost 2 years working together. At its core are the tenets, a dynamic editorial presentation of BVNs core priorities, providing a deep understanding of their practice at a glance. Connecting projects to ideas not only creates unique ways to explore but it also ensuring audiences with limited architectural knowledge are respected and engaged. This consideration for the user is continued through the UI and UX, allowing users to dive deep into the site, but never get lost – rabbit holes with hand rails. BVN’s vast archive and myriad of ongoing projects are made more accessible than ever before.

Systemic change via system thinking

Brand Transformation

Collective Creativity

Digital

Art Direction

Copywriting

Digital Strategy

Film

Motion

Divine Farmer

Rich storytelling through New Age motifs and a focus on education bring the Divine Farmer brand to life. Born amidst the post-pandemic age of self-care, this Californian wellness company sought a name and identity that could combine its roots in traditional Chinese medicine, and ambition to build deeper understanding and trust in alternative remedies. With mental health symptoms surging during the COVID-19 pandemic, nurturing mental and physical wellness had never been more important. Divine Farmer sought to address this by taking a broader view of wellbeing – addressing issues like anxiety, depression and insomnia.
It was during the pandemic lockdown that Polina Bowler—an acupuncturist and herbalist who runs LA based holistic wellness center 'East Meets West'—stuck upon the idea for the brand. Whilst restricted to counseling patients over Zoom, she had developed a blend of Chinese herbs and Nano-Emulsified Water-Soluble CBD to help those suffering from symptoms of anxiety. The feedback was so overwhelmingly positive that she decided to open her new formula up to a wider audience – and with that her first product was born. 
Naming this new venture required delving into the rich history of traditional Chinese medicine and mythology – it was through this process that we came upon the story of the Divine Farmer, an ancient mythological ruler who is fabled to have taught humans which plants could be used for medicinal purposes. The notion of a spiritual teacher perfectly mirrored Polina’s desire to provide education about alternative medicines and healing, whilst also encapsulating the only-natural nature of her ingredients. Ethereal, trustworthy, and natural: Divine Farmer encapsulated it perfectly. 
Building on the name, we embraced a contemporary New Age spirit for her visual identity; utilizing symbols inspired by mythological and natural references to tell stories of harmony, vitality, and earthly connection. Paired with a 1970s California-esqe palette of earthy hues, and an eye-catching luminescent yellow, the resulting brand packaging provides a fun and cathartic unboxing experience. 
With multiple new products under development, the world of Divine Farmer is constantly expanding. So check out the website to dive deeper into the Divine Farmer’s world of wellness and self-care.

Concocting a wellness brand through stories and symbolism

From Product to Brand

Herbal Healing

Packaging

Naming

Dior

One of the biggest names in global fashion, Dior decided to share its fascinating story through a public gallery at its address of 75 years. A website that displays a 3D model of the brand’s Parisian home, and a digital companion guide to the physical exhibits both enrich and amplify the visitor experience at La Galerie Dior. 

From humble beginnings to global megabrand, Dior has occupied space at 30 Avenue Montaigne—now a storied address that encompasses a large corner building, close to many other prestigious Parisian fashion houses. To share the brand’s evolution from Christian Dior’s original vision in the late 1940s through to international success today, Dior decided to open a permanent gallery space above its flagship store to offer visitors the chance to learn about its history where it unfolded.
La Galerie Dior is designed as a journey through the building, touring various rooms on multiple floors that each have a specific link to the brand’s past. The old desk where Christian Dior sketched his early designs; the atelier where seamstresses crafted haute-couture garments; the salon where the brand’s first runway show took place… each space is treated uniquely through beautiful scenography, lighting, and audio-visual effects.
The Dior team required two elements to enhance the gallery experience: a website to provide practical information and ticket booking before arrival, and a digital visitor companion for use during the self-guided tour. The website went far beyond the brief, and includes a 3D model of 30 Avenue Montaigne that can be navigated room by room—similar to the physical gallery—with each transporting the user to a particular era and pivotal moment in the brand’s history. A further section will soon allow Dior to publish visually driven stories centered on specific themes, e.g. its application of the color red through the years.
For the digital companion guide, a progressive web app (PWA) that is publicly accessible over a URL was developed to avoid one-time downloads from the app store. Visitors use their own devices to scan QR codes found beside a selection of the gallery exhibits. Each takes them to an Instagram Story-style slideshow that offers a richer understanding of the object through video, imagery, quotes, and more.
Since La Galerie Dior opened in March 2022, the company has been overwhelmed by its success and popularity. The digital components have played a critical role in ensuring that the experience is rich with information, immersive in its storytelling, and accessible to as many visitors as possible.

Guiding visitors through the history of a famous French couture house

Going Digital

Fashion Forward

Le Crans

High up in the Swiss Alps, the Hotel LeCrans is a haven of serenity above the clouds. An identity that’s equally calming, and art direction that takes full advantage of the spectacular scenery, work together to represent a new luxury that comes from getting away from it all.
Close your eyes. Take a deep breath, and imagine you’re inhaling fresh Swiss Alpine air while hearing only the breeze rustle the trees and birds chirping in the distance. That’s what to expect when staying at Hotel LeCrans. Nestled into the steep slopes of Crans-Montana, a popular destination for hiking in summer and skiing in winter, the hotel blends into the green of the surrounding forest. Its remote location, and an inherent calm that only comes from a complete immersion in nature, allows guests to cut themselves off from the world. The pine scent, the bright sunlight and the breathtaking mountain views invite those staying to harness the restorative powers of nature. After years of existence, this mythical hotel and spa was transformed to regain its luster, while retaining its original appeal. The owners wanted LeCrans to be a home away from home, an experience that would be revitalizing and restful for every guest. Every detail of the space is designed to create an understated sense of luxury, far from the disturbances of everyday life. Pinewood paneling, unparalleled views, impeccable service, refined cuisine and a world-class spa all ensure guests feel deeply pampered and well cared for. A similar detail-oriented approach was taken to the renewed visual identity, which is crafted to provide a calm, discreet, and warm impression. The beauty of the natural setting is brought to the forefront. From the new logotype, appearing as if carved in the wood of a mountain chalet, to the artistic direction of imagery through which the dizzying landscapes reveal the raw and wild dimension of the mountains. Applied together across the website, marketing campaigns, social media and more, the identity and art direction present a timeless luxury that embodies the very best of Swiss Alpine luxury, tranquility and sophistication.

Escaping the everyday at a five-star Alpine retreat

Peace & Quiet

Biennale of Sydney

The Biennale of Sydney presents contemporary art from around the globe on the shores of Sydney Harbour, and the surrounding suburbs. As Australia’s most high-profile art event, it plays a vital role in Australia’s cultural engagement with the world.
The 23rd edition, titled rīvus (meaning ‘stream’ in latin) and curated by José Roca, is imagined as a series of conceptual wetlands situated along waterways of the Gadigal (Sydney) and Burramattagal (Parramatta) peoples, spanning 5 venues and including 330 artworks from 89 participants. These imagined ecosystems are populated by artworks, experiments, activisms and research, which together follow the currents of meandering tributaries, expanding out into a delta of interrelated ideas.
Working with our friends at <a href="https://zolo.press/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Zolo Press</a> we created the visual identity, communications, signage, and supported in the production of a massive 572-page companion publication, all in deep collaboration with José and the Biennale team.
The rīvus identity which was inspired by the aqueous themes underpinning the program flows throughout mediums and venues, binding contributors and audiences together through language. This is made possible by the bespoke liquid typography developed in close collaboration with Biennale contributor Virgil Flores. Based on a printed garalde typeface, a surplus of ink fluidly connects characters, words and ideas.
To launch the event, we developed a campaign celebrating waterways from around the world as active participants within the Biennale. Our national poster and billboard campaign invited these aqueous beings into dialogue with urban environments throughout Melbourne and Brisbane, before building towards a crescendo in Sydney to coincide with the Biennale opening.
Arriving two long years since the last edition was cut short as Covid took hold of the country. This current edition opened at a time when floods ravaged Northern NSW and Queensland. Poignant timing that further served to emphasise how ecological crisis, and the effect of colonisation on First Peoples' custodianship of ecosystems, are far more than themes; they are a reflection of our reality.
Lastly, ‘<a href="https://www.biennaleofsydney.art/participants/a-glossary-of-water/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">A Glossary of Water</a>’, a monumental publication that exists as a companion to the Biennale, designed by Zolo Press with support from Base. Expanding the urgent topics of the Biennale far beyond its duration and location – the book highlights the deep connections that Australia has to its waterways and bodies of water. Following the logic of a glossary, it includes approximately 80 terms as headings and “definitions”, such as creek, dam, estuary, flood, weave and weft. Printed sustainably on excess paper stock of different types and weights from previous book projects, rather than recycled paper, the profile of the publication takes on the look and feel river sediment.

Collapsing the hierarchy between nature and culture

A stream of ideas

Book Design

Brand Campaign

Signage

Ace & Tate

For one of the most exciting eyewear brands in Europe, a sunglasses campaign with… no sunglasses. Instead, ads for Ace &amp; Tate’s Spring Summer 2022 collection featured people squinting from the sunlight—evoking a universal feeling that highlights a need for a product, instead of the product itself—as part of a wider strategic reframe.
As one of the most disruptive, pioneering, and successful eyewear brands on the European market since launching eight years ago, Ace &amp; Tate found itself at a turning point and gearing up for substantial growth. What started as a request for a campaign evolved into a full brand and communications strategy refresh in close collaboration with the in-house creative team. This process crystallized what the brand was all about. It drew out the essential, stripped away the unnecessary, and laid steady and unequivocal foundations for the next stage of its evolution.
The goal was to remind customers that Ace &amp; Tate is unconventional and daring; smart and out-of-the-box in everything it does, from eyewear design and production to retail experience and communications. Maturing the brand’s strong existing culture also involved bringing out its innate Dutch-ness—straightforward and resourceful—and its focus on sustainability. 
Armed with this renewed brand positioning and attitude, a striking two-part campaign for Spring Summer 2022 was devised to convey Ace &amp; Tate’s unique approach and cheeky/sunny personality. 
Part one of the campaign riffed on a universal feeling: being dazzled by the sun. Models were photographed by Martina Bjorn squinting in bright light, in desperate need of sunglasses. A campaign for shades without showing any sunglasses was a bold move, but the 'by subtraction' approach evoked rather than showed, underscoring a universal need instead of simply presenting the product as a traditional brand would do.
For the second part, the eyewear collection was photographed on the same models, using a strong zoom to first draw attention to the models’ expressions and second on the frames themselves. It was revealed just weeks after the first, to an audience whose attention and gaze were already captive. Apparently, it worked. The weekend after the initial launch brought the second-best sales day of Ace &amp; Tate history, and the campaign has been featured in multiple creative publications as well as all over social media.

Selling sunglasses without a lens or frame in sight

Bright Idea?

Daily Provisions

Casual all-day cafe Daily Provisions had a stellar team and a unique idea behind it, but its branding wasn’t quite rising to the occasion. Its established logo was subtly evolved into a full identity system and visual concept, preparing the company for expansion across NYC. 

Daily Provisions is a recent venture from restaurateur and Shake Shack founder Danny Meyer, whose Union Square Hospitality Group also runs beloved and acclaimed NYC favorites including Gramercy Tavern, The Modern, Maialino, and more. His latest concept is positioned as a neighborhood kitchen that serves everyday favorites with extraordinary quality and service. This bakery, dining and coffee spot is intended as a place for pause in a fast-moving world, for those who appreciate care as much as convenience.
The original Daily Provisions identity had helped the brand establish a loyal audience, but didn’t provide enough for ambitions to expand. To enhance the brand, interventions ranged from redrawing the logomark for enhanced legibility, to imbuing the concept of a morning-to-night cafe into visuals and messaging.
Though Daily Provisions locations had an easily recognizable color scheme, this wasn’t reflected in the branding. The deep, inky blue of the storefronts was therefore extended across all visual elements, from packaging to marketing materials. Tweaks to the fluid hand-written logo—slightly adjusting character forms, narrowing spacing and increasing the weight—greatly improved legibility on facades and beyond.
The continuous line of the logo also became a metaphor for time. This simple graphic element evolved into a variety of illustrations by Lara Berg, which elegantly trace into forms that fit in three categories. Icons reflect the menu, Moments depict instances of joy and pause, and Scenes capture the energy of the cafe environment and the city. These unifying gestures refer to the everyday in a way that’s unexpected and extraordinary.
Since the updates, Daily Provisions has scaled-up from one to four locations across Manhattan—becoming not just a neighborhood kitchen, but the neighborhood kitchen in some of the city’s most dynamic locales. Yet despite fast expansion, the brand retains its commitment to delivering exceptional quality and surprise to everyday life. Try one of their crullers (if they’re not sold out) and you’ll see what we mean.

Refining the identity for New York’s neighborhood kitchen

From Startup To Scaling up

Baked to Perfection

Sentral

Following a seismic societal shift towards remote work and nomadic living, Sentral has found a niche by offering short, long and swappable stays at apartments in the heart of America’s most desirable cities. A bright identity, playful art direction and iconic logo all embody the brand’s concept of Home+, which encapsulates this new approach to living. 

Sentral is an urban network of connected, residential communities that is establishing a new category in flexible living. A collaboration between real-estate investment firms Iconiq, Highgate, and Ascendant, the brand was born to cater for the fast-growing number of people no longer required to live or work in one place.
Sentral members can choose between furnished or unfurnished, serviced apartments in newly renovated buildings packed with amenities—staying as long as they desire in exciting cities like Los Angeles, Denver, Austin, and Miami. And when they’re ready for a change, it's easy to swap locations or temporarily rent out their apartments while away, all through a simple app.
Since the brand merges much larger ideas about how we live, travel and explore, Sentral required a bold and playful identity to tap younger generations who are increasingly adopting a more mobile lifestyle. A bright and optimistic shade of yellow alludes to the energy and opportunity that this way of living facilitates.
At the center of the identity—quite literally—is a “+” icon that not only replaces the “T” in Sentral, but represents the accretive concept of Home+ and all the additional benefits that come with being part of the Sentral community. The tagline, “Home is when you belong,” also denotes a community that is connected emotionally, as well as technologically through the app, at any time or place.
While the + symbol visually ties together all Sentral properties, illustrations by Chris Delorenzo adorn the walls of the building lobbies to encapsulate what’s unique about each location. Animated versions of his drawings also enliven the brand’s digital spaces. The playful sketches accompany photography that follows hospitality and fashion tropes, casting a wide array of characters to showcase the varied lifestyle aspects and inclusive nature of the brand. 
Sentral is poised to fundamentally change the way people live, setting a standard for a more open and flexible definition of “home”. After launching in 2021 across nine US locations, plans are afoot for national and international expansion so that very soon, Home+ will be available to a far-reaching community of potential nomads. Now that is a plus.

Facilitating a new flexible lifestyle for nomadic workers

Home Redefined

The Goodtime Hotel

Standing out among South Beach’s crowded hospitality scene requires a fresh outlook and approach, and Pharrell Williams and Dave Grutman had a very particular mood and atmosphere in mind for their hotel project. When it came to translating this feeling into a brand, the result was a subtle identity that’s intentionally subservient to the Instagram-ready interiors, high-quality service, and one-of-a-kind experience at The Goodtime Hotel.
Musician Pharrell Williams and nightlife kingpin Dave Grutman teamed up with Eric Birmbaum of Dreamscape to create a destination unlike any other in one of the world’s most distinctive tourist hotspots. Positioned in the lively heart of South Beach, The Goodtime Hotel was carefully designed to target the growing number of image-conscious younger people visiting the city for weekend escapes and group vacations in the sun.
The founders’ vision from the very start was to create an atmosphere that allows guests to feel immediately welcome and comfortable, no matter how they intend to spend their stay, and an aesthetic that quintessentially looks and feels like Miami. Branding this feeling required distilling all of the elements into a light, subtle, almost ethereal identity that blended with the other design elements. 
Theatrical and whimsical interiors by award-winning designer Ken Fulk blend tropical motifs and a plethora of pastel tones, creating the perfect backdrop for countless Instagram photos, and an endless stream of user-generated content that forms the backbone of the hotel’s marketing campaign. 
The pared-back logo, an abstraction of a Japanese “arigato” pose, references the high level of service and care put into the guest experience. The mark is sparingly applied to items like bathrobes and tissue packets, as well as the translucent room keys that serve as each guest’s passport to the good time wonderland. A similarly simple bespoke typeface, a typewriter-style in all lower case, adds to the casual, laid-back air of the identity. 
With the help of big-name clout and abundant social media coverage, the hotel immediately gained a reputation as the place to see and be seen in South Beach. While its identity is intentionally deferential to the strong personality of other design elements, it serves to complement and uplift the dreamy idyll of vacationing in style—whether that means lazing in a cabana, or dressing up for a night on the town (or both). Either way, the hotel’s popularity proves that it delivers on its promise to provide a good time, all of the time, for everyone who visits.

Branding a feeling at Miami’s hippest hotel

Happy Place

Mudam

When the Covid-19 pandemic forced the world online, museums also had to quickly adapt to this shift to virtual interaction. Exploring the idea of humanity today, Mudam’s Me, Family exhibition became a highly interactive and participatory digital experience that brought visitors closer to the art, and closer to each other.

Struck by a national lockdown, the Museum of Contemporary Art of Luxembourg (Mudam) was compelled to evolve its ambitious group exhibition Me, Family into an online visitor experience. By exploring alternatives to typical digital showcases and pushing technological possibilities, a highly interactive concept was developed to tie into the curators' vision, while placing the art at the center of the virtual exhibit.
Me, Family was a show about humanity today, and this theme was taken quite literally. Visitors could only enter the exhibition if they turned on their webcams, so people from all over the world were brought together in a way that felt very… of the moment. Participants could also customize their video stream with a social media-like AR filter. Once face-to-face with the art, they were able to interact in real-time with everyone else who was online concurrently.
The result was a never-before-seen, cutting-edge and engaging exhibition that directly involved every observer, rendering everyone an essential part of the experience. The outcomes were astonishing, with visitors debating art, conducting online dates, and even arranging stand-up meetings for their teams—all within the virtual environment.
During its eight-month run, Me, Family reached thousands of visitors from over 95 countries, a first for Mudam, while ensuring the integrity of the artists’ work and ideas. The project also allowed the museum to consider future opportunities for remote programming and events, bringing even more people together in an increasingly digital world.

Redefining the very notion of the online exhibition

Virtually Together

Iles de Paix

As one of Belgium’s oldest NGOs, Iles de Paix’s mission is to promote sustainable food systems across the globe. A thorough overhaul of visuals and messaging, completed pro-bono, firmly re-establishes its vision and values while incorporating an iconic representation of the brand’s fundraising efforts.
Everyone has the right to food. So for 60 years, Belgian non-government organization Iles de Paix has supported farmers and citizens in the development of sustainable food systems, sources of autonomy, security and quality food. 
 
The NGO raises money to fund specific projects in the developing world, each referred to as “une île de paix”—an island of peace—with the aim to move towards impactful change one step at a time. One of its earlier nationwide fundraising campaigns involved selling little plastic figurines, which became an icon across Belgium and are still associated with the brand today.
 
This humanoid silhouette has become a critical element of the new Iles de Paix identity, incorporated into the logo as a dot above an X, while also acting as a multiplier across the communications. It represents the volunteers, donors, team members, farmers, collaborators, and experts who all contribute to the organization’s meaningful efforts—a human chain around the globe.
 
Iles de Paix’s outdated visuals and messaging drastically needed to become more contemporary, attractive and dynamic, to compete with younger NGOs and to feel appropriate for a very different, more globalized world than when the organization first began. Through intense workshops with internal and external stakeholders, a total makeover resulted in verbalizing a new mission statement, clearer positioning, a new visual toolbox, a revised tone of voice, various campaign concepts, and even fresh ideas to raise funds.
 
The work for Iles de Paix was completed entirely pro-bono as part of an ongoing yearly initiative. Given the same resources and dedication as any other project, the team was able to rejuvenate the organization strategically, verbally, graphically and visually, so it can continue its mission to guarantee the right to food through enacting change in the fields, in our cities, and on our plates.

Nourishing the identity of a historic NGO

Food for Thought

For the engineers at Swiss company -T-, their work is much more than technical expertise—there’s a huge creative aspect too. The new identity for this century-old company highlights the rigor of engineering and the creativity it enables, while bridging the past and future of a tech-driven brand. 
All of -T- group's work goes beyond the realm of structural quality, durability and sustainability; it brings out the creative dimension of construction engineering. In forging the -T- brand image, we drew on the paradoxes inherent to the practice of engineering, which lies at the intersection of clients' dreams and architects' constraints. 
Using structural nodes and connections as a reference, a custom typeface was generated by manipulating letterforms with pinches at stress points and shifts that resulted in serif-like indentations—appearing both efficient and future-oriented.
Immediately comparable to a structural blueprint, the web and marketing graphics feature white type on a rich blue background. Furthering the parallels to construction drawings, the website is navigated with a crosshair cursor that constantly displays the x-y coordinates of its location on the page—similar to CAD programs.
Projects are presented online alphabetically, using large letters to organize the image-focused icons like a catalog. On each project page, photos sized almost full-screen demonstrate the scale and beauty of structural engineering feats, both completed and in-progress.
By consistently applying the contrast between high-tech and creativity to all the elements of -T- group's identity, we enabled the group to build a highly distinctive positioning in its domain, and to confidently assert its own world vision and ambitions for a future that’s built better.

A blueprint for spanning high engineering and creativity

Building Bridges

Comédie de Genève

A century’s worth of theatrical excellence has taken the stage at one of Geneva’s principal performing arts institutions. Now settled into a dazzling, purpose-built new home, La Comédie has an updated identity that matches its ambitions to shake-up reality with surprising, thought-provoking productions for another 100 years. 
Steeped in history, the Comédie de Genève has delighted theater-goers of all ages and backgrounds since its founding in 1909. Birthed to offer everyone access to art and beauty, it has grown into a much-loved local institution that, despite its name, evokes all manner of emotions through the wide variety of performances. Laughing, crying, and everything in between.
A recent move to a much larger, bolder building—designed by FRES Architectes in the city’s burgeoning Eaux-Vives district—has allowed directors Natacha Koutchoumov and Denis Maillefer to flex their creative muscles, scaling-up their experiments at La Comédie’s previous home into shows that fulfill their ambitious vision for presenting new perspectives on the past, present and future.
To accompany this important milestone, a new identity crystalizes the center’s boundary-pushing spirit. La Comédie welcomes everyone through its doors, so this identity had to be accessible and friendly, while still reflecting the ambition and thoughtfulness of the programming.
Each communication medium is envisioned as fertile ground for providing audiences with experiences that challenge and confront reality. Bright pink serves as a strong visual connector, and a typeface with vertically staggered letters both expresses a sense of movement and mimics the architectural profile of the new building.
Imagery that palpably displays the joy of reuniting with loved ones after so long apart was chosen to entice audiences to meet one another again at the unique building, turning it into a place that’s full of life. Messaging conveys the adventures that audiences can expect to encounter during the theater, contemporary dance, and circus productions hosted during the 2021-22 season and beyond, as well as sparking dialogues outside the walls.
The broader goal is to expand this platform for French-speaking actors to work with local and global directors, as a venue that’s open to both Swiss and international artists. The identity helps to elevate La Comédie to its position as a production house operating at a European level, and will enable it to reach new heights as an iconic theater with international influence.

Emboldening the theater of multiplied experiences

Provoke Reality

Bozar

Brussels’ center for fine arts Bozar is a catch-all for culture in the heart of the city. Eschewing a logo and empowering the ubiquity of its name, the institution’s updated identity converses with its audience, reflects its dynamism, and responds in real-time.
As Belgium’s number-one cultural institution, Bozar amalgamates music, fine arts, cinema, architecture, literature and more alongside a restaurant, a brasserie and a bookstore––all within a grand building designed by Victor Horta in 1929. Bozar’s rich offering draws visitors from all ages and walks of life, but its visual identity had become serious, rigid, and slightly boring. It was time for a refresh.
Taking precedent from some of Europe’s top cultural venues––with which Bozar plays in the same league––a more daring, flexible and impactful approach was required to elevate it from an established institution, to a leading name in Belgium and beyond. To achieve this, a set of five principles were laid out to guide a new identity and shape the brand’s future communications.
Firstly, acknowledging and leveraging the fact that Bozar has become a word with its own meaning and gravitas. Since the name was controversially introduced by Base in 2004, it has become ingrained in the vocabulary of Belgians and is used as both noun and verb. Rather than designing a new logo, we chose to simply embrace this moniker.
The second principle involved creating a conversational tone of voice––one that asks questions of its audience and invites them into a dialogue. Delivered via a neutral typeface and a unique multilingualism, with custom flourishes introduced through ornamental punctuation.
Next, communicating in real-time with messaging that reacts to current events and embraces the spontaneity of content created during its programming.
Principle four introduces radical simplicity, because less is more impactful.
And finally, acknowledging Bozar as a place in perpetual movement, constantly shifting its programme and audience, which is reflected in a modular visual system for its digital and social platforms that can be easily implemented by the institution’s communications team.
Bozar’s long-standing relationship with Base allowed for a deep dig into the heart of the institution, in order to rediscover and convey its energy in a living voice. More conversations have already started.

Lifting a Belgian icon from established staple to leading voice

Cultural Bazaar

For over a century, FTD has innovated in the floral delivery market by creating an international network of independent businesses, and connecting them with customers around the world. Tapping into the joy that we all experience through giving, a fresh identity brings the brand up-to-date, while celebrating its local-first approach, rich history, and stories of its talented florists. 
Way ahead of its time, FTD took a bottom-up approach to building a network of local florists, allowing these small businesses to sell and distribute flowers globally. It grew into a vast, wide-reaching international cooperative of florists who rely on the company’s logistical prowess to deliver lovingly prepared floral arrangements on behalf of customers. For over 111 years, the company has pioneered this shop-local model–one that is evermore critical in the post-pandemic world.
The floral delivery market has shifted to a more direct-to-consumer model in recent years, with retail giants and startups alike offering their own services. But what FTD can profess is a history of innovation, decades of experience and expertise, and a commitment to supporting independent, family-run companies that is more relevant than ever. A refresh of the brand had to restate this heritage and push the local-first message, so that FTD could once again become the leader of the pack.
Since the traditional etiquette of giving through handwritten notes and personal communication has been somewhat lost, yet remains wholeheartedly valued, the principal strategic move was to focus on this universal harbinger of joy––which also underscores the fundamental idea behind FTD’s business. Encouraging customers to “Give Better,” the new branding centers on the warmth and personal touches that go hand-in-hand with sending flowers, whatever the occasion, bringing FTD back to its roots at the forefront of personal giving.
The brand’s heritage was also reclaimed visually. The Mercury Man, FTD’s faithful insignia that is proudly displayed in florists’ windows in even the tiniest French villages, was too important not to retain. He is now accompanied by a logomark in a new contemporary typeface that also scribes the company’s founding date, providing a stamp of historic excellence and projecting its experience as a leader to today’s customers.
A lush and confident shade of green, chosen to complement blooms of all genera, forms the backbone of the identity. Simple art direction allows the beauty of the flowers to do all the work, uplifted by pale tones and soft radial gradients that highlight the shapes and hues of bouquets.
FTD’s relaunch galvanized the entire company; and the internal sales team delighted in sharing the updated look and feel with its florist collective––who now feel like they are part of a brand that truly represents their craft. Stories about these artisans also form a narrative through the company’s marketing and social media campaigns, providing well-deserved exposure to the businesses that facilitate the joy of giving, which is what FTD has always been about.

A heritage company reclaiming the lost art of giving

Flower Power

Virisens

Bringing together the best of nature and biotech, Virisens is the newest Swiss skincare brand combining the purest form of cannabis molecules with the latest generation of safe cosmetic ingredients. Appealing to a niche market of skincare connoisseurs with an affinity for cutting-edge cosmetology, Virisens was created with highly potent anti-aging ingredients while remaining vegan and cruelty-free. We worked on the entire brand identity and joined forces with advertising agency Miind for a 360° approach.

Giving your skin a cannabis prescription

Swiss Cannabis Science

The Substation

The Substation is a unique large-scale multi-purpose gallery, performance space and dance studio housed inside a former industrial building in Melbourne’s inner west. Presenting a curated program of contemporary and experimental work to a broad audience, while simultaneously operating as a vital community hub. The Substation inhabits a unique space within the Australian cultural landscape. What began as a website redesign soon evolved into a complete re-imaging of their brand and communications. Beginning with the visual identity, we proposed a system that operates much like file directory tree syntax. The forward slash within the wordmark acts to intersect and aggregate ideas, and allowing for endless experimentation and play. 
Supporting this system is an (anti-)logo designed to subvert the aforementioned structure, and to evolve over time. Launching with 15 iterations, these will be updated seasonally reflecting the artists and themes present within the programming in any given year. This curated aspect of the brand identity ensures it remains deeply and visibly connected to culture, and the context within which it operates. Building upon the ideas in the brand system, we redesigned The Substation website as an evolving archive. The new website provides greater access to the unique diversity of current and past programming, and a deeper perspective on the organization itself. Notions of compression and release are central to the experience of the new site; whether it’s the syntax of the page titles, the way content is blended together via gradient, or obscured via static and noise, or the “double squeeze” effect of the menu. Accessibility hand-in-hand with experimentation.

Emphasizing accessibility hand-in-hand with experimentation

Connecting Culture and Community

Berney Associés

Charles Berney founded the Berney Associés Fiduciary company in Geneva in the 90s. Although the family-run business is in direct competition with Switzerland’s Big 4, their main advantage has always been found in their personal commitment to their clients - partners and family members offering a deeply personalized approach. Today, the family business is being handed over to the next generation: Laurent, Frédéric and their associates. With a traditional background and history, the new era needed a fresh face that showed what the future of financial counseling looked like. The main goal of this rebranding was to create a contemporary but realistic image of the company’s future. Anchored in values of excellence, precision and safety it was also important to show the new approach of this young, dynamic and uninhibited business. We developed an image that set Berney apart from its competitors - a strong font gave the brand the personality it deserved and highly contrasted but corporate colors bridged old and new. Finally, we made sure Berney was ready for their sector's digital revolution by helping them build a strong on-line presence. We created a website that doubled up as a communication platform so the company could use it to update the conferences they were attending, business news, fun facts and case studies to help them anchor their practice.

How to brand the new generation of financial consulting

Sharp, Serious and Swiss

West Space

West Space is a vital non-profit, artist-led organization in Melbourne, Australia, focused on supporting local and underrepresented artists at all stages of their careers. Base worked with the West Space team to evolve their brand identity, and develop a new digital platform that extends their art and ideas beyond the gallery space (while we were all stuck at home!). This involved close collaboration and heaps of trust, since the majority of the process played out over Zoom. Since its inception, West Space has challenged definition and championed diversity, creative freedom, and risk-taking. So early on we realized we needed to avoid a style-guide-driven approach to branding, in favor of developing a visual language over time. This began with a strong foundation; a new industrious condensed sans-serif typeface inspired by scaffolding. Its exaggerated punctuation provides the organization a distinctive visual language, while a unique set of symbols / emojis ties to its program. Operating as a metaphor for the role the gallery plays in supporting Australian artists and their work, it also acts as the scaffolding of the brand. A platform upon which to experiment and build. Upon this foundation we built West Space Offsite: a new digital platform rapidly developed during Melbourne’s COVID lockdown to enable publishing artist-led content online. Sitting both beside and beyond West Space’s physical exhibition program, it extends art and ideas outside of the gallery space. Coinciding with a move into a new physical gallery space in Collingwood Yards – an independent not-for-profit social enterprise – our work marks a new chapter in the West Space story. But it’s far from over. We’re continuing our collaboration with a comprehensive website refresh launching soon.

Rethinking the white cube gallery as a Rubik’s cube

Onsite offline. Offsite online.

Federal Studio

Federal is a Swiss studio, based in Geneva and Zürich, which specializes in photography. Its new brand identity reflects the studio’s artistic approach, one that melds contemporary art and the corporate world, deconstructs codes, orchestrates chaos, dabbles with paradoxes, and playfully arouses viewers’ senses.
In shaping Federal’s identity, we found inspiration in Helvetic culture and its many contradictions, like the tendency to seldom agree with one another yet always decide together; to abide by the rules yet shake them up when necessary; and, to be understated yet unabashedly quirky. These paradoxes infuse Federal’s vision in photographing art for business, and lead its work to reveal elegance in chaos, bring order to disorder, and deconstruct clichés by playing with established codes.
With its new identity, Federal has become a gateway to surprising experiences and unexpected face-offs. On its website, images are superimposed to create unsettling contrasts, and the tone of voice shows us how new meaning can arise from the joint use of totally opposite words: Iconic &amp; Iconoclastic, Beautiful &amp; Ugly, Chaotic &amp; Orderly… a universe of harmonious dissonance created by Régis Golay.

Harmonious dissonance

A gateway to surprising experiences

Mai Lam

Vietnamese fashion designer Mai Lam is a force of nature. Her fascinating and moving story from riches to rags to entrepreneurial artist has shaped a mindset that fuses pride in the history and culture of Vietnam with a contemporary vision of the country. And in combining workers’ jackets with intricately detailed embroidery, or vintage silk coats with knock-off t-shirts, Mai Lam’s garments embody this mindset in a collision of real and fake; cheap and chic. 
This creative chaos produces beautiful and original clothes, but previously caused some confusion from a brand perspective. One of her most prominent endeavors, the primely located Mai Lam boutique in Ho Chi Minh City needed structure and separation from her other artistic pursuits. Her fashion line required a strategy that would set it apart, and set her up for global success.
When the designer first turned to Base for an outsider’s input, we traveled to Vietnam for a photoshoot with our long-time collaborator Régis Golay. The photos immersed the apparel in the dynamic, modern city streets from which Mai Lam draws so much of her inspiration. Working alongside these two artists, we brought order and sensibility to their creative concepts, resulting in powerful imagery that truly captures the spirit of the brand.
The brand strategy that followed adapted existing elements––logotype, photography, narrative––into a framework that provided specific communications tools and a digital focus, to invite customers into her world via a website and social media.
Given total freedom, no expectations, unwavering confidence, and pure creativity, we transformed a disorganized artistic project on a fancy street into a revived, radical fashion label with clear vision, direction, and international appeal. Bringing a brand to a global stage that has a very local perspective, that’s inherently Vietnamese, and is reflective of Mai Lam’s boundless energy and masterful execution was a breath of fresh air for the world of high fashion.

Clashing cultural elements inform a dynamic Vietnamese fashion brand

Cheap vs Chic

Neybor

Co-living could solve the issue of increasing density in our cities, yet many brands that sell shared accommodation are cold, clinical, and not particularly enticing for potential residents. Belgium’s Neybor envisions the future of co-living as a series of much warmer, more soulful environments, and its identity leads with the idea that home isn’t a place, it’s a feeling.
In the next 20 years, many cities are predicted to double in size due to overwhelming urbanization. While co-living seems to be a promising solution, the dominant tendency of players in this booming sector is to sell standardized adult dormitories by way of cold, generic brands. Neybor chose to view the concept differently. Founded by a group of architects and designers, the company obsessively focused on one central question: when does a space become a home? The answer was channeled into carefully considered interior design, building community spirit, and, of course, branding––which is where we came in. The brand identity was developed based on the intangible, yet universal idea that home isn’t a place, but a feeling. To bring this idea to life, talented illustrator Olga Prader was commissioned to embody this emotionally driven concept through a series of whimsical drawings. Her sketches seamlessly interact with subtle art direction and a witty tone of voice to create a soulful brand for contemporary living. Neybor’s tone of voice is casual, friendly, personal, and welcoming, as if potential residents are speaking to a friend inviting them to stay. Its website is set up as a place for telling stories about home, and presenting homes with stories. The uptake in Neybor properties has boomed, and the company has opened three locations in less than a year since launching. The brand’s home-oriented approach, putting its “Neybors” first and foremost, aims to elevate the standard of living in cities and a points to a bright future for the co-living phenomenon.

Ensuring that a co-living brand feels like home

Fair Share

Silversquare

Coworking pioneer Silversquare has provided spaces for entrepreneurs to thrive since 2008. But with a huge surge in competition from similar business models, the brand needed a refresh to prove why individuals and companies should choose its offering over others. A dynamic, user-friendly identity system comprising simple elements was designed to be combined in limitless ways, in the same way that Silversquare envisions its spaces.
Silversquare was early to the coworking game. Created by entrepreneurs, for entrepreneurs, it workspaces for companies of various sizes across Belgium and Luxembourg, whether they require a hot desk, a private office, or a bespoke solution for a larger team. Each of the sites is designed and crafted by a guest decorator or artist to create uniquely compelling venues, As the popularity of coworking increased during the 2010s, so did the number of rivals offering a very similar model to Silversquare’s, and all touting their unique selling points or attributes. Silverquare needed help communicating the core characteristics that made it so successful initially. In this case, youthfulness and a flamboyant personality were what first attracted occupants. So these were reflected in a dynamic, user-friendly brand identity system consisting of simple elements that can be combined in limitless ways. A rudimental square became a tool for compartmentalizing information, visuals and various options for potential clients on physical billboards and marketing materials. On the website, the quadrangles are divided and shifted through animations, serving as flexible boxes that can display anything required. The tagline “The most exciting square meters in town” was added to give the impression of space to rent, while alluding to the vibrant communities that frequent the different locations. The “SQ” abbreviation applied across communications refers to the company’s name, and also implies an area of undetermined size to be utilized. By evoking a mastery of spatial planning, the new brand work helps to position Silversquare as an enabler for professionals and their entrepreneurial endeavors.

Branding the most exciting square meters in coworking

Hot Desks

ING Bank

When ING Bank held an exhibition of its contemporary art collection, the challenge was to lift visitors beyond passive spectators, and engage them as part of a dynamic conversation around the artworks. To do this, it was imperative to go beyond the typical poster/banner/website trilogy by creating a smartphone tool that would articulate the themes and kickstart the dialogues.
Hosted at the ING Art Center in Brussels, an exhibition themed around “Love. Hate. Debate.” was held to showcase the history, breadth and diversity of ING Bank’s contemporary art collection. Using the often polarizing and contentious nature of contemporary art, the intention was to invite questions and opinions from the audience––enabling them to draw closer and form personal connections with the works on display. To help facilitate participation in the debate, a holistic communications system was required that would integrate all aspects of the show: curation (what to see), communication (what to say), and experience (how to interact with it). A full kit of tools, from spatial to digital, messaging to imaging, web app to catalog, was developed to lure visitors into discussions. Upon entering the gallery, a larger banner read: “This is not an exhibition. And you are not just a visitor.” This set the scene for a series of introductory prompts; first impressions one might form when viewing contemporary art. "My kid could have drawn that", "Do you see what I see?", "It's just a piece of wood, right?" These statements and questions invited a wide and diverse public to entertain an open dialogue with the artwork. Avoiding the hassle of downloading yet another app, a Progressive Web App––a website that adopts app-like functionalities––was developed to offer supplementary commentary and additional information about the works and themes. It was critical not to distract visitors from the powerful emotional connection experienced when face-to-face with the art. Instead of a catalog, a book titled “Stories of a Collection” was designed as a keepsake––documenting the history of the collection and allowing narratives to continue far beyond the exhibition. The 360-degree approach to building a journey through the collection also encompassed texts, furniture, spatial layout, and images that together created a unified experience. The result of this co-curation and collaboration was a great symbiosis between ING and all the creatives involved in the process: designers, strategists, scenographers and developers. This synergy allowed us to imbue ING’s collection with intrigue and allure, and develop a unique story around the exhibition.

Inducing meaningful conversations around a contemporary art collection

State of the Art

Caudalie

A pioneer in sustainable skincare for 25 years, Caudalie required a makeover that aligned its packaging with the same eco-credentials as its revolutionary products. Applying a “Backwards Branding” methodology, the brand was built around the redesigned packaging that uses recycled plastic, and carefully sourced paper and materials, to minimise waste and lower the company’s carbon footprint.
Benefiting from the visual nature of social media and its ability to educate, the skincare market has seen consumers become more demanding of creative visual content and cleaner, better products––prompting brands to re-think their packaging, boxes, messaging and photography. One such brand is Caudalie, established in the French wine region of Bordeaux in 1995, where founders Mathilde and Bertrand Thomas created the very first vino-therapy beauty products. A quarter of a century later, the company decided to strengthen and clarify its brand to expand its cult following in one of the world’s fastest-growing industries. Using an approach we like to call <a href="https://www.basedesign.com/opinions/backwards-branding">Backwards Branding</a>, the work began by rethinking the first physical object the consumer interacts with: the packaging. Since Caudalie’s skincare formulations are all sustainably produced, it became apparent that its containers, boxes and wrappings should follow the same ethos. Refocusing on recycled materials, particularly plastics, and sourcing other materials with minimal environmental impact led to the creation of a new packaging system that better reflected Caudalie's commitment to sustainability. Straight-forward, visually striking, ecological and transparent, this packaging became the brand’s best ambassador. Launched with the Resveratrol Lift line of creams and serums, which received high praise on social media, the rebrand was rolled out gradually to allow Caudalie to transition to the refreshed look and feel. The new branding remains true to its original image but elevated with a more minimal aesthetic through discrete transformations of typography, iconography, logo and product color range. As our collaboration with Caudalie has continued, the company has also revealed its 100% Plastic Collect initiative––which saw it recycle 600 tons of plastic in 2020––and maintained its participation in the 1% for the Planet reforestation project. The brand’s commitment to sustainability is now apparent across its full output, so customers can rest assured that their purchases are both good for their skin and good for the planet.

A facelift for France's pioneer natural skincare brand

Skin Deep

Chinah

Chinah is introducing Americans to more traditional Chinese cuisine, with meals based on family recipes made using healthy and authentic ingredients. Breaking away from stereotypical take-out required a fun and flavorful identity inspired by the freshness of the food.
Hegel Hei, who serendipitously met Base during an event at our NYC studio, had a vision to flip the American perception of Chinese food on its head. He founded Chinah to serve authentic home cooking in a fast-casual manner, using his traditional family recipes and fresh ingredients to create dishes that are true to the culture, as well as healthy and delicious. The challenge was to develop a brand that felt both Chinese and American, breaking the stereotype while remaining respectful to other establishments.
Cleverly, “Chinah” is both an adaptation of the country’s name, and a translation of “eat where” in Mandarin. It’s presented in a plump bespoke typeface that was influenced by the food, and can be written on a single line or stacked vertically over two. Playful phrases like “Daily Yum” and “Tastes Like Home” also adorn packaging and digital assets, along with the color red—a symbol of luck, joy and happiness in Chinese culture—chosen in a brighter vermillion tone than restaurants typically use.
The art direction centered on showing the freshness of ingredients and demonstrating Chinah’s home-style preparation techniques. Similarly, the tone of voice is friendly, welcoming, and helps customers feel like part of the family around the dinner table.
Chinah now has multiple locations in the tri-state area and grand plans for regional expansion. With support from the local Chinese community and customers from every background imaginable, the brand is quickly gaining fans who fully appreciate eating Everyday Tasty Chinese food, prepared grandma’s way.

Flavoring a new take on Chinese fast food

Daily Yum

Energy Observer

Through expeditions and innovations, the Energy Observer ship is exploring practical solutions to accelerate ecological transition whilst developing new technologies in electro-hydrogen power. These big ideas and actions needed to be more approachable and understandable for a broad audience, so the data and experiments were translated into valuable, easy-to-read information that can be followed online by anyone.
Climate change continues to be a pressing but challenging subject in today’s world, and plainly explaining the issues and potential solutions to avert cataclysmic disaster has become imperative. One of these potential solutions, the advancement of hybrid electro-hydrogen power, is the focus of Energy Observer—a repurposed racing catamaran exclusively powered by this renewable energy source. The brainchild of sailboat racer Victorien Erussard and professional diver Jérôme Delafosse, who hope to raise awareness of a more sustainable future, the project involves a seven-year expedition around the world to highlight pioneering energy alternatives, and explore green solutions through science and tech. Due to the complexity of the project and the topic, Energy Observer required a brand and a digital experience that could clearly communicate its vision and goals, and allow the public to follow along with the journey. With an “Elon Musk meets Cousteau” feel to the project, a global narrative was crafted to simplify Energy Observer’s story as the mother brand, and to embody its two principal elements. The Odyssey charts the journey of the vessel itself, allowing audiences to follow the “logbook” of the catamaran in real-time via an immersive dashboard on the website. A map and a timeline that track its route reveal, with a simple click, additional information about each stage of the voyage and the content produced. The Innovations portion of the site uncovers greater detail about the Energy Observer laboratory, and its research and development across science, engineering and technology in renewable energy. Since Energy Observer set sail in 2017, the team has made huge strides in demonstrating the possibilities of hybrid electro-hydrogen as a green energy source. By sharing its progress in a clear, coherent and visually compelling format, it is educating a wide audience in the potential of this game-changing technology, which could be critical in the fight against the impending climate crisis.

Clarifying the mission of an experimental round-the-world odyssey

Push the Boat Out

Allies and Morrison

While most architecture firms use a website to display a portfolio of work, the Allies and Morrison site offers a much deeper exploration into the context and empathy behind each of its projects. Conceived as a “hub of knowledge”, the digital experience reveals previously unseen facets of the design process, and has become an important tool of discovery for both internal and external use.
In contrast to many “starchitect” bureaus, Allies and Morrison approaches its work with a focus on fostering communities through context-driven projects. The international firm of architects and urbanists based in London has a growing team and strong convictions on contemporary architecture, so decided to embark on a rebrand that better reflected its heritage and aspirations. An extensive strategy phase led to the idea of using the website as a platform that deeply reflected the very essence of Allies and Morrison's practice, which would also become the primary medium to express and define the new brand personality. The focus shifted from the firm itself to the projects, and their impact on the wider environment. Traditional brand codes like the logo were therefore deemed less important, while philosophy was pushed to the fore. Instead of finding the practice name in the top left corner of the homepage, a search bar invites visitors to explore an immense hub of knowledge. Internally, this function serves as a database so employees can easily find specific projects or initiatives. Externally, it allows curious parties to type in any word, material, location, process or team member and discover all of the content linked to their search. The classic navigation tabs are replaced by themes and preoccupations that are important to Allies and Morrison, and direct links to drawings and models that sit at the very core of the craft. Since the firm is more concerned with location context––whether that’s from a historical, ecological or societal perspective––than solely the appearance of the finished building, the portfolio section of the website is designed as a space for extensive case studies that take the reader through the full process and story of each project. Stepping away from the classic portfolio website often presented by architecture studios allowed us to brand Allies and Morrison through a digital experience, using their values and beliefs as the main elements for their new identity.

Unearthing the DNA of one of the UK’s most prominent architecture firms

Site Specific

La Monnaie

Brussels’ La Monnaie views the historic art form of opera through a present-day lens, so its communications should equally reflect our society today. For over a decade, Base has collaborated with artists to create provocative and visually arresting campaigns that are unique and unexpected each year—firmly positioning the opera house as a leader in its cultural field.
Most opera houses have a tried and tested formula for their communications, typically involving imagery of singers and sets, “baroquesque” typography, and name-dropping Mozart, Wagner, Verdi and the like. But under the direction of Peter de Caluwe, La Monnaie (a.k.a. De Munt) in Brussels has approached opera as a contemporary genre that bridges the past and present. His intention is to align the historic art form with modern society, addressing prominent issues and current affairs that affect people of all backgrounds. Based on this vision, we created a new visual identity for La Monnaie in 2007, and have since helped the director to communicate his ideas through annual campaigns. From the outset, we challenged the art direction by avoiding the classical and cliché opera imagery. Instead, we decided to collaborate with a different visual artist on each seasonal campaign, to gain access to beautiful and unexpected imagery. The new visual voice of La Monnaie became metaphorical, radical, cinematographic—the language of fashion and beauty—and brought a fresh and surprising perspective year after year. For the 2019-20 season, in line with a new seasonal structure that shifted from thematics to an “architecture” centered on creativity, illustrator Charlotte Chauvin “remixed” the La Monnaie identity with emotion-driven, Cocteau-style drawings connected to the pieces of the program. In 2020-21, de Caluwe felt it critical to explore the decline of democracy and society’s trust in politics. These themes were embodied in actual, grotesquely dramatic media snapshots of white male parliamentarians physically fighting in their respective country’s chambers of democracy—images so arresting that they appear to be staged. In capturing today’s unnerving political turbulence, the campaign aligned the institution directly with contemporary culture. Outside the expected channels like billboards and brochures, La Monnaie’s communications have also involved a freely distributed magazine that brought the opera world to life. We chose the name MMM, or Monnaie Munt Magazine, to address Belgium’s bilingualism and reach a larger potential audience. For more than a decade, we’ve channeled the intrinsic creativity of La Monnaie through artistic collaborations, divisive visuals and an evolving contemporary identity – helping the opera house become and remain a landmark in the field of culture. We’re still hitting the high notes in harmony.

Harmonizing opera with contemporary culture

High Notes

Deezer

In the competitive landscape of music streaming apps, Deezer needed to offer its users a real, personalized experience. Based around a single idea, “you bring the moment, we bring the music,” a specific interface was introduced across all dimensions of the brand via a shared visual vocabulary – from the smartphone to the ads – to which music lovers could feel a genuine connection.
Digital streaming quickly overtook physical CDs and records in the mid-2000s to become the dominant resource for playing music, and competition between various apps offering similar services was immediately hot. Personalization became the key to enticing users to favor a particular platform, since music choices are driven by individual preferences, moods, and tastes. For French company Dezeer, our plan was to advertise curated track selections that catered towards all of life’s moments, essentially providing a soundtrack for every occasion. In verbalizing this strategy and crafting a tone of voice, we created a simple system to show what Deezer can do for its listeners: You bring X and Deezer brings the music. Uniting the brand’s communications and its app through one shared visual (hieroglyphic) vocabulary, a mix of typefaces, icons, colors, and shapes were applied across all channels and media. This created a seamless experience where the borders between print and digital, product and brand disappear, and on-line and off-line are constantly overlapping. It also allowed Deezer to adopt a more organic and consistent approach to its communications. With users spread across 180 countries, the brand’s character had to remain consistent yet adaptable to local requirements and cultures. To highlight Deezer’s ability to amplify life in whatever situation, the brand uses a playful tone of voice that is always culturally relevant and on point. Ultimately, we helped Deezer develop a coherent and unified brand that speaks to users all over the world, and gave them the tools to transform music listeners into music lovers.

Changing the tune of music streaming

Sound Up

andSons

A luxury chocolatier in… Los Angeles? Using creativity that’s quintessentially Californian, AndSons has broken the mold of traditional confectionery in every sense. Base channeled this into branding and packaging that presents layers of contrasting forms, visuals and ideas, and elevates the products into even more desirable gifts. 


Desire is what drives consumers to indulge in a luxury item like chocolate. These small, sumptuous sweets are given as gifts to make the recipient feel special, loved and impressed by the gifter. This exchange of goods and emotions can be elevated by beautiful design and thoughtful packaging, ensuring the contents are even more desirable. In a crowded market, impact is key, and branding has power.
Now chocolate and Beverly Hills aren’t really two things that are associated with one another. But when a family confectionary shop just off Rodeo Drive decided to launch its own brand, the worlds of chocolatier expertise and LA creativity collided in spectacular fashion. The mother retired, and her sons Marc and Phil Covitz took over the business, teaming up with inventive chocolatier Kriss Harvey to playfully rethink the traditions of the confectionery world. AndSons was born, and its branding needed to reflect its exceptional new take on luxury chocolate, and create that all-important desirability.
Since andSons is so far from the chocolate houses of Europe––both geographically and conceptually––the brand bravely experiments and pushes the industry in a new direction. A stark departure from packaging tropes has allowed andSons to keep its distance and remain true to its place.
California’s creativity and spirited optimism is expressed through bright colors and naively hand-cut illustrations, juxtaposed with a sophisticated typeface that pays homage to the classicism and tradition of chocolate-making. The graphics are placed on white backgrounds to allow for customization, together forming an association with the elevated aura and collectibility of modern art. Flip-lid boxes became dual horizontal sliding sections that represent two sons, two generations, and the dichotomy of innovation vs heritage.
With packaging that’s as delectable as its contents, a visual identity system that’s playful yet elegant, and a vision that brings a new perspective to chocolate, andSons is able to fulfil the desires of both customers and gift recipients. All without a brown box or gold letter in sight.

Driving desire with a new perspective on fine chocolate

In for a Treat

Gillion

To ensure century-old construction company Gillion stands out in today’s competitive market, its builders are positioned as experts in their field and its model was shifted from B2B to B2B2C. This new consumer-oriented focus also informed an identity that appears to be in perpetual construction, valorizing the building process and breaking the codes of a traditional industry.
One hundred years of experience in building the future has helped family-owned Belgian construction company Gillion to bring projects across multiple sectors from concept to reality. At its heart, it is a company of builders, who possess a deep knowledge and savoir-faire that is rarely celebrated or communicated to the public by the industry. The value of this essential role in the development of our urban spaces became the focus of the rebrand for Gillion, which put a spotlight on these builders rather than leaving them behind the scenes. Another important strategic move was to shift the positioning of Gillion from a B2B to a B2B2C company, helping end users to better understand the services they are receiving. This was achieved in-part by a new visual identity, created to valorise the building process while introducing a fresh perspective to this industry. The brand's updated visual language refers to its unique building spirit, with a logo, visual and copy assets all envisioned to be in perpetual construction. ​​To help establish this identity, Gillion’s construction sites became in-situ communication touch-points for the outside world. Large, bright-yellow tarpaulins featuring wordplays and real-time information provided surrounding neighborhoods with updates and plans for next steps. The identity was also applied to practical, visible items like jackets, helmets and trucks, as well as all things print and digital, ensuring it could be seen and felt everywhere––both internally and externally. Fresh eyes on a company that had been operating for a century imbued a new energy into its communications. Through restoring value to the role of the builder, we established a greater sense of trust and confidence in Gillion as an authority in its field.

Highlighting expertise in the construction industry

Build Better

ifaw

In order to undertake its critical work improving the welfare of animals and people alike, IFAW needed to reach a younger and broader audience that shared its values and believed in its mission. Through new reportage-style messaging, documentary-esque imagery and more dialogue with its audience, the non-profit organization was able to significantly increase engagement and donations, so it can continue to save the world. 


Trust, in this day and age, is a rare and invaluable commodity. And it’s one that NGOs like the International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW) are traditionally built upon, despite an opaque system that sees donors give, and organizations provide little information in return. While this monolinear approach might have worked in the past, young philanthropists are demanding more transparency and tangible results in exchange for their hard-earned cash.
To successfully meet the challenges of the next 50 years, Base strategically determined that organizations should be less monolithic, and instead increase dialogue with their constituents. For IFAW––which has explored new ways to improve conditions for animals and people across the globe for the past 50 years––this meant improving its messaging on population and habitat conservation, channeled through fact-driven activism rather than beautification or sensationalism.
The team saw the benefit in defining a set of clear principles to help guide its mission and engage the public in its causes. These ideas inform messaging in a tone that’s direct and to-the-point, using language and visual treatments that simply explain the issues being tackled, and calls to action that spell out how concerned parties can help. 
Online, graphics take a back seat, but support the “bite-sized” informative texts in the form of animations that connect problems and solutions. A focus on documentary-style photography shows experts at work in the field––a departure from the pretty pictures or shocking scenes used by similar organizations. Along with interactive infographics and an explorable map, the immersive website is able to both present facts and tell stories.
Our work with IFAW provoked other NGOs to form similar bi-directional relationships with their audiences. This openness and transparency cultivated trust in a new generation of younger donors who are aligned with and feel passionate about IFAW’s mission to protect animals, people and the planet. This has allowed the organization to continue its vital work strongly and effectively––something we’re very proud to have contributed towards.

Engaging a new generation of donors who demand a better planet

Conserving Trust

Bob Dylan Center

The life and work of Bob Dylan is celebrated at a new cultural center in Tulsa, which aims to inspire and influence generations of music fans. Pulling elements from Dylan’s archives, from annotated manuscripts to woodblock-printed posters, Base captured the spirit of his 60-year career with an identity developed in reverence to his craft. 

No one represents the sound of Americana like Bob Dylan. Layering twangy guitar strings, high-pitched harmonica harmonies, and masterful storytelling through song––which earned him a Nobel Prize, no less––his music is as important to US culture today as it was in the 1960s and 70s. (Who’s humming the riff from ‘Hurricane’ while reading this?).

Along with the release of a critically acclaimed new album in 2020, the creation of a cultural venue dedicated to Dylan’s life and career was announced for the Tulsa Arts District. As the primary public venue for The Bob Dylan Archive, this center will curate and exhibit an extraordinary collection of more than 100,000 items spanning the musician’s career, and facilitate the study and appreciation of his music and worldwide cultural significance.
When imagining an iconic visual identity system for the center, we sought to celebrate 20th-century Americana through imagery based on protest posters of the 60s. For both the on- and offline presence, the ink-blue annotations found in Dylan’s manuscripts provided inspiration. Typefaces evocative of American newspapers, but with a contemporary flair, and the woodblock types used for many of Dylan’s concert posters and record sleeves also served as influences for the final product. The resulting logotype visually fuses the familiar (Bob Dylan) with the new (The Center) while emphasizing the importance of the site’s location in Tulsa.
Slated to open in 2021, in a building by world-renowned architecture firm Olson Kundig, the center will serve to educate, motivate and inspire visitors to engage their own capacity as creators. And its holistic brand experience will help create an appropriate home for one of America’s most important artists.

Representing the life’s work of one of America’s greatest songwriters

Mr Tambourine Man

The New York Times:  Food Festival

The first New York Times Food Festival aimed to democratize the news organization’s culinary content, by assembling top chefs from across the city for two days of public tastings, talks, and activities. Enticing the masses with a playful and festive identity, and a liberal serving of red, the sold-out event brought New Yorkers of all ages and backgrounds to enjoy food together in Bryant Park. 


NYT Cooking hosted its inaugural three-day Food Festival in one of NYC’s most beautiful locales, Bryant Park, bringing together the cream of New York's culinary scene for an “IRL experience” created to feel approachable and inclusive for attendees. A unique environment, identity and digital platform were all pivotal in achieving this while explaining, quite literally, what’s cooking.
The festival’s trio of events––The Park, The Talks and The Nights––celebrated food cultures and presented personal behind-the-scenes stories in distinct ways. Therefore, each required a unique voice and treatment, while still legible as part of a coherent system. We approached this like a set of ingredients that come together to make a meal, using playful and spontaneous graphic elements and gestures to represent the varied flavors of the events––all united by the color red.
For The Park, the web page mimicked the experience of discovering the myriad stalls at Bryant Park, via a grid structure that showcased each chef/restaurant with animations and images. The Talks page was designed with a more editorial feel that reflected the planned conversations, with modules across two columns activated by hovering over the hyperlinks.
Finally, The Nights page that listed evening activities was reversed in black, with a single column used to translate the intimate and bespoke quality of each dinner. Bringing it all together are small surprises scattered throughout the website, imbuing a sense of serendipity and fun.
Through its iconicity and festivity, the identity appealed to all of New York’s food fanatics and expanded the NYT’s subscriber base to include a broader audience. Tickets for the festival itself sold out in days, The Nights was fully booked within 24 hours, and the at-capacity festival garnered substantial media coverage. The proof of the identity’s success is therefore in the pudding.

All the best ingredients for a visual feast

Joy of Cooking

Orior

With sights set on global expansion, Irish furniture company Orior required an identity that embodies the DNA of its heritage, and a strategy for the brand that would catapult a family business to a leading position in a niche market. Base imparted a 360-degree visual ecosystem that celebrates the brand’s rich roots and real customers––flying the flag for Ireland’s take on luxury craft internationally.
When family-run Irish furniture business Orior set out to expand into the US in 2018, creative director Ciaran McGuigan naturally looked to the Italian megabrands he admired for inspiration. But when this direction fell flat, he seized an opportunity to look inward, define his company's values, and exploit its “Irishness” instead––eventually enabling Orior to successfully launch in another country and a highly competitive industry.
During on-site workshops, we pinpointed what makes Orior’s Irish roots significant: stamina, loyalty, grit, and heart. These traits guided a strategy that positioned the brand uniquely in a niche market, and offered a chance to tell a story about culture, craftsmanship, and connection. A new way to look at furniture, made lovingly (and perhaps unexpectedly) in Ireland.
Since Orior’s signature is contemporary twists on timeless designs (picture a traditional sofa in royal-blue velvet), we reflected this approach in the identity and art direction. In the logotype, O’s and R’s are tweaked for more personality, and two typefaces were selected to balance classic and contemporary. Emerald green used liberally across communications aptly represents the Emerald Isle, further embodying the country’s DNA in the furniture brand.
Our first editorial shoot captured products with flash photography as part of lively, dynamic scenes, rather than in empty interiors. Another campaign features real Orior customers interacting with their furniture, while more web photos reveal the workshops, tools, and craftspeople fabricating the designs. This imagery forms a consistent visual ecosystem spanning from digital to print to spatial.
When the brand relaunched in Manhattan, the press latched onto the idea of Irish design as a warmer, more authentic alternative to some European counterparts. And customers found comfort in knowing the first name of the artisan making their couch. Orior became the poster child for transparency and personality in the furniture industry, differentiating it from existing heavyweights in this sector.

Revealing the authenticity and heart of Irish design

Part of the Furniture

Studio Brussel

Once a driving force for Belgian youth culture, Studio Brussel had lost its edge. We helped the radio station reclaim its position as a leader in the country’s music sector through an identity and a typeface that assigns a visual voice to the sounds of a new generation. This rejuvenation began inside the company, and expanded to capture a fresh audience by way of engaging content that we brought alive through digital tools.
In the age of downloads and streaming services, radio still plays a vital role in discovering new musical talents, curating a sound of the moment, and forming communities of listeners. Studio Brussel – a popular Dutch-speaking radio station in Belgium – has done just that since it was founded in the 1980s. Through several genre shifts, visual campaigns and reinventions – just like the artists it supports – the station has continued to set trends and capture the zeitgeist.
Although it maintained a vivacious and youthful energy, Studio Brussel had lost its edge and become increasingly mainstream. The leadership decided to revamp the brand identity to revisit its Rock’n’Roll roots, reclaim the gritty spirit, and reconnect with its fan base of young people. Keeping its essence while igniting a shift in programming and content creation, we were able to rejuvenate the radio channel while reconnecting to its position as the major reference for music culture in Belgium.
This shift began inside the national broadcast company, involving the producers and hosts in the brand expression. The next step was to put music back at the forefront of content and visuals, in order to impact a new generation of listeners. Studio Brussel never took itself too seriously, so channeled its diversity and spontaneity into a more conscious brand vocabulary.
Most Belgians already referred to the station as StuBru, so it felt natural to use this shorthand to steer the new identity (many didn’t even notice the name change). A glitchy custom typeface was developed to symbolize a disruptive attitude and introduce letters with a sense of rhythm. Paired with sharp imagery that used flash photography to create a “caught in the moment” look, this gave a visual voice to the music.
 
We updated the graphic layer of the website and visually clarified the navigation structure, creating an improved digital tool for audience growth. The new identity was also applied to physical environments, including the signage and mics at the StuBru studios. Its flexibility also made it perfect for announcing concerts and festivals, branding shirts for its bicycle racing team, and adorning merchandise.
The connection with youth culture firmly reestablished, Belgium’s greatest radio station was again able to rule the airwaves, represent the ideals of its listeners, and engage daily with its community as a leader in the music sector for the whole country. Mic drop.

Recapturing the edgy spirit of Belgium’s rebellious radio station

Tuned-In

Institut Français de la Mode

When two disparate Parisian schools joined to unite all areas of fashion education––creativity, technical skill, management––under one roof, Base was tasked with branding the world’s next top fashion institution. While facilitating a successful merger through the rebrand, we also brought the new IFM increased credibility and a heightened reputation that would entice future fashion talent from across the globe.
In 2019, YSL co-founder Pierre Bergé’s fashion management school IFM merged with craft-focused École de la Chambre Syndicale de la Couture Parisienne and added a creative department, forming the sparkling new Institut Français de la Mode. This union of local Parisian institutions brought the challenge of elevating IFM’s business-only reputation to that of a credible creative college, and transforming it into an attractive global name. IFM required an identity that resonated with the designers, couturiers and business moguls of the future. Our objective was to balance the institutional with a young contemporary attitude, pushing the freshly introduced fashion design programs by bringing a creative feel across all channels. A bold and generous updated digital attitude was imperative to attract prospective students living 5,000 miles away. We also played up IFM’s prime location in Paris––an internationally renowned fashion mecca––through a bespoke serif typeface that feels quintessentially French, yet is infused with block-like dots and accents that give it a harder, more youthful edge. To make the merger successful, Base gathered teachers, students, and alumni from the two schools’ many departments for a series of workshops and interviews – to conciliate high-level institutional questions with the expectations of the youth, and underscore the need for visual and strategic unity across the institution. The outcome was a simple toolkit that could be applied and adapted by everyone at IFM, across building signage around its home at the Cité de la Mode et du Design as it expanded by 200% over three years, as well as prospectuses, website, social media, and other communications. Art direction was outlined by us, but undertaken by the students and faculty. They have great taste, after all. Fashion has a tendency to take itself too seriously. But while respecting the heritage and excellence of the school, the identity for IFM is fresh, light, elegant, and has touches of humor too. It fits, as they say, like a glove.

Merging two prestigious schools into a world-class institution

Prince Estate

The immense responsibility of safeguarding the unique artistic vision of music and cultural icon Prince was not lost on the Base team. In branding his estate, we developed a rich, digital experience to drive visibility for potential partnerships and to further engage past, present and future fans.

Prince. Prolific. Symbolic. Iconic… Need we say more? His status is cemented in the minds of generations of fans who have incredible respect for the artist, and such a deep love of the music. Prince’s untimely death caused the world to reevaluate his colossal impact on pop culture, spanning multiple eras, names, genres, and styles. And in this process, an important question arose: how do you ensure the legacy of a legend for generations to come? 
The Prince Estate, which is tasked with just that, wanted to find ways of introducing and reintroducing audiences to the late musician’s work that are as innovative and forward-thinking as he was. Educating existing and new fans of any age, but particularly younger audiences, in a way that captured Prince’s unconventional and experimental spirit was of utmost importance. 
Rather than bringing together all things Prince in a single website, we produced a series of microsites that encompass different aspects of his life and career. These ranged from an immersive annotated discography to a website exploring his early years, to a tool allowing fans to generate their own content expressing what Prince means to them.
We then released the sites one by one, in the same way that an artist drops singles or albums. This not only allowed us to digitally tailor the look, feel and interactivity of the microsites to specific themes, but build anticipation and sustain momentum around the work––something to which the music industry constantly aspires. The sites ladder up to a central hub, so the platform remains lean and easily adaptable to future technologies, trends, and an unlimited amount of upcoming content.
Receiving multiple award wins and nominations, this entirely radical approach to the preservation of a life’s work, conserving an artistic vision, and furthering engagement in Prince’s genius has ensured one thing: his legacy will live on.

Ensuring the legacy of an undefinable icon

Sign O’ the Times

Maison Dandoy

Founded in 1829, the family-owned artisanal bakery Maison Dandoy was stuck in the past. A holistic makeover encompassing packaging, digital, retail spaces, and ad campaigns brought the brand up-to-date—transforming it into a Brussels staple and looking to its future as a globally successful business.
A longtime favorite of Brusseleers and well-kept a local secret, Maison Dandoy has baked delicious treats since the early 19th century. Its signature spiced cookies, known as speculoos, are still made using the family recipe and traditional method. But these were too delicious not to be shared with the world, so what started as a modest identity redesign quickly became an ambitious project to create a full brand universe for the business. Work began by building a creative strategy. Independent research was supplemented by interviews with family members and other key stakeholders, as well as first-person customer insights, all to absorb the culture of Maison Dandoy, its habits, and its products. Once the story and vision were clearly laid out, the separate brand elements followed. The logo acts as Maison Dandoy’s visual blurb, bundling its core story into a neat and tidy graphic, while packaging is sprinkled with gold polka dots that look as if they’re fresh out of the oven. Finding the right tone of voice was also crucial for transforming the Maison Dandoy identity into a personality. The cookies became droll, cheeky characters—a bit like the court jesters of the past, which made sense for a brand that combines history and pleasure. The identity also manifested physically across several stores that act as extensions of the company’s universe and values. Seemingly floating marble countertops that display the full product offering, spherical brass lamps that mimic the gold dots, and hand-painted logos that adorn the windows—not to mention the smell of freshly baked cookies—all add to the atmosphere of warmth and delight to be enjoyed across generations. Following the rebrand, Maison Dandoy increased sales by more than 50%. The company is growing internationally year after year, now operating a store in Tokyo and distributing to luxury food purveyors Bon Marché, Galeries Lafayette, Dean &amp; DeLuca, Colette and Marks &amp; Spencer. No longer a Brussels secret, the brand and its goods can now be sampled around the world.

Shaping a beloved local bakery into an international icon

Graanmarkt 13

The Graanmarkt 13 house in Antwerp is much more than a residence, containing a restaurant, a high-end concept store, and a rentable apartment all under one roof. After creating an identity for this unique destination, based around poetic sentences rather than a typical logo, the launch of a branded product line and online store saw us return to the project to help it spread its influence far beyond its location and become a name recognized worldwide.
In the heart of Antwerp’s historic commercial district sits a very special house, where each floor tells a different story. With a restaurant in the basement, a fashion and lifestyle store on the first floor, a gallery on the second level, and an apartment to rent on the top, the building is a haven for those in search of objects and experiences with soul and meaning. Conceived by Ilse Cornelissens and Tim Van Geloven as a place of discovery and for the good things in life, collaborating with exceptional talents like art director Bob Verhelst, architect Vincent Van Duysen, and chef Seppe Nobels to create an experience that’s always full of surprises. In the spirit of "anti-branding," the Graanmarkt 13 address was kept for the name, and a tone of voice and a story was adopted rather than a fixed logo. The identity was built around poetic sentences, written on shopping bags and product tags, which have become iconic across Antwerp and serve as collectible items among fans of the house. When Graanmarkt 13 initiated a series of products and services, the challenge for each new addition started with the same question: how to translate the atmosphere of the house into something concrete, like a perfume or a food truck? To reach customers far beyond Antwerp, the Graanmarkt 13 website was developed beyond a tool for practical information and reservations, as a place for personal stories to be told, beauty to be explored, and carefully curated products to be bought. The user-friendly shopping interface offers a distinctive online experience that mirrors visiting the house in-person. Over the years, Graanmarkt 13 has added a shoe store, a food truck, and a canteen at Antwerp fashion museum MoMU to its oeuvre. Storytelling remains a fundamental pillar of the identity, always with Graanmarkt 13 as the signature, but the tone of voice it adapted for each product. This has allowed the house to organically evolve from a destination in Antwerp, to a brand that reaches far beyond its own walls.

Brand as poetry for a multi-faceted lifestyle destination

House Proud

The New York Times: Times Talks

When The New York Times brought its award-winning journalism to a live audience, it required an identity that both conveyed the exceptional quality of the dialogues and could entice young attendees. Our visual system––easily adapted to the series’ myriad speakers and topics via a bespoke digital tool––elevated TimesTalks high above other conference series, captivated a diverse audience, and reflected the unique cultural relevance of every discussion. 

News today is consumed in so many different ways, and traditional media companies are quickly evolving in order to keep young audiences engaged. For The New York Times, one of the most trusted and revered news sources in the world, this manifested as a series of live conversations between its journalists and visionary voices in film, art, theatre, music, fashion, technology, politics and business. Think Al Gore, Ai WeiWei, Greta Gerwig, Grace Jones…
With so much digital content readily available, these in-person TimesTalks needed to encourage physical participation in important conversations of our time. And although live event series are by no means novel, most feel corporate and serious with branding that focuses on the organizers, rather than the ideas.
For TimesTalks, our approach was to give speakers and topics equal footing, via a bespoke digital tool that allowed a magnetic, animated identity to be easily adapted for hundreds of events. This tool allowed the Times’ design team to easily implement the graphic language, explore the entire range of color and type, and maintain consistency from event to event. 
A palette of 212 color combinations and 24 cuts of Franklin &amp; Cheltenham typefaces provided a flexible range of expression within a cohesive system: from serious to playful, bold to serene. The left-right arrangement of text nodded to the dynamic dialogue that TimesTalks is all about. This visual system also came alive online, where viewers could watch live talks or browse the extensive archive of past discussions.
The editorial focus better represented the diversity of discussions, and challenged the visual code of conference series. It enabled the Times to fill its seats with young viewers who were excited to take part, and set a new standard for live journalism––one that’s intelligent, sophisticated, culturally relevant, and of course, enjoyable.

Treating journalism as informative entertainment

From Page to Stage

Los Angeles Master Chorale

While exploring the many facets of the Los Angeles Master Chorale through the contemporary lens of its home city, we recognized this misunderstood art form as primal and deeply human. The resulting brand celebrates the “Voices of LA,” challenges the visual codes of chorale and classical music, and aligns with the personable vibe of Southern California. 


Although LA isn’t typically considered a birthplace of the classical performing arts, it is perhaps unexpectedly home to “the nation’s most pioneering major chorus." The Grammy-nominated Los Angeles Master Chorale, an independent and innovative professional vocal ensemble, performs classical and contemporary compositions at the famed Walt Disney Concert Hall––an icon of the city. The group shares this architectural masterpiece with the celebrated LA Philharmonic, with which it frequently performs. But the chorale desired its own identity, brand and marketing strategy that would set it apart from both the venue and its other occupant, and evolve it into an “icon” in its own right.
In collaborating with the Master Chorale, we sought to rethink the visual codes of classical music. An early insight was recognizing that singing is one of the first arts. Incredibly egalitarian, it requires no tools or instrumentation, and has a nearly transcendental effect on those who hear it, regardless of background. In our increasingly digital world, a thoroughly analog, elemental art form like choral singing is as compelling and relevant as ever.
With this in mind, we drew inspiration from the deeply personal aspects of vocal chorus to create a set of custom typefaces that reference sheet music, and as well evoke the mechanics and feeling of the human voice.
We also wanted to profoundly connect the Master Chorale with contemporary LA. Looking beyond the concert hall, we fashioned a unique voice that acts and appears deeply human, sun drenched, and as unexpected as the chorus itself.
No longer simply “the voice of the Walt Disney Concert Hall", the Master Chorale now represents the many “Voices of LA.” These resonate and reverberate far and wide thanks to a post-rebrand dramatic increase in ticket sales, memberships and donor gifts––signalling a change of tune for the chorale’s bright and sunny future.

Giving a Grammy-nominated chorus its visual voice

In Harmony

Degroof Petercam

The merger of two private banks into Degroof Petercam called for a logo that perfectly balanced those of its predecessors, to aid its future success. Through flat design and high execution, the usual tropes of banking imagery were replaced with new codes that feel in line with contemporary high-end users.
In 2015, Belgian private banks Degroof and Petercam merged into a new financial institution, which needed a contemporary brand that would shake up the traditional banking sector. The identity needed to reflect the commonalities of both original companies, preserving what made them both unique, while speaking to clients looking for expertise in contemporary finance. A symbol made from the initials of both brands places the letters in perfect harmony, and endlessly in motion, as a bold but friendly, contemporary yet established design. The logo also integrates a version of the Romain typeface, modified by trimming some serif letters into sans formats. This creates a balance between tradition and modernity that forms the core of the new identity. After creating a brand identity toolbox, we joined forces with advertising agency AIR in order to offer Degroof Petercam a 360-degree communication system for implementation and campaign development. Posters employed our contemporary symbol in a very classical way, almost like a baroque ornament, again reflecting the traditional-modern equilibrium. In today's world, a bank like Degroof Petercam has to provide its clients with an efficient yet distinctive and pleasant online experience. A big challenge was to design a UI that takes banking industry standards to a new level, while keeping usability as the top priority. A UI that works neatly, and allows for beautiful design. The identity was implemented by the Degroof Petercam team, so a digital tool was developed to provide clear and user-friendly guidelines to assist them. Hosting this tool online allowed our designers to update these guidelines easily, ensuring the Degroof Petercam team always followed the most up-to-date version. A highly successful merger was achieved through a combination of flat design and high execution, resulting in a brand that speaks the language of today’s private banking customers.

Merging two private banks into one that’s valued by all

Money Matters

Meatpacking District

NYC’s Meatpacking District is where old and new; grit and sophistication; commerce and culture all collide. Visually placing these contrasting elements side-by-side celebrates the unique creative energy that exists between them, building civic pride by embracing the neighborhood’s contradictions rather than trying to reconcile them.
The last two decades have seen warehouses, hourly hotels, and underground nightclubs become luxury retail, high-end restaurants, and world renowned-art venues in New York City’s Meatpacking District. Along the Hudson River, a formerly industrial swathe of land has transformed—but not behind some new, opaque facade. Quite the opposite, the Meatpacking District’s history bleeds into the present, creating a chic urban district with remnants of a gritty past running through its veins.
The neighborhood’s visual identity makes no attempt to reconcile these opposing elements. Instead, they sit side-by-side, honoring the tension that defines this area and capitalizing on the energy it creates. The story of the Meatpacking District is told through dichotomies. The logo is split between a bold sans-serif and an elegant serif, the website uses two columns that scroll independently, and photography by Sacha Maric captures the often dissonant architecture, spaces, activities, and people at the neighborhood’s heart. 
Informative brochures and clear maps provide a guide that presents the Meatpacking District’s chaos as magic, not madness. The website—one of the first of its kind—uses dual-column format to balance the beautiful with the more utilitarian. Users can plan their visit and peruse local attractions at the same time. The digital experience draws visitors into the heart of the community, inviting them to join community yoga, drag brunch, and bingo instead of experiencing it as an outsider passing through.
The Meatpacking District’s contrasts between day and night, culture and retail, chic and gritty are what make it unique. Branding centered on juxtaposition helps celebrate these clashing elements and support the neighborhood’s continued development. Tangibly, that means investments in the Meatpacking District are on the rise and local vacancies are low. But beyond that, impact can be measured through feeling—civic pride is at an all time high as the neighborhood embraces all of the contradictions that make it so beautiful.

Instilling civic pride in a neighborhood of contrasts and contradictions

Perfect Dissonance

MoMA: Design Store

When design e-commerce sites emerged with curated offerings of world-class items, MoMA Design Store needed to regain its competitive edge in this field. By leveraging its ties to the prestigious museum, and the idea of "shopping the unshoppable" works of priceless art, we brought to light many of the stories behind the objects––which both highlighted the store’s credibility and added value to the customer experience. 
Ten years after branding the MoMA Design Store in Soho, the Museum of Modern Art's retail division called on us again to communicate the evolution of its shops. With competition from established European brands opening retail spaces in NYC and the rise of several e-commerce startups with similar offerings, the store needed to redefine how it spoke to consumers across digital, print, and physical channels.
One thing MoMA Design Store had that its competitors did not was the credibility of the museum. Aligning the two closely, the concept of "shopping the unshoppable" emerged as a method of treating the objects for sale like collectible artifacts. This entailed highlighting historical facts, designers, or technology; celebrating the concept behind the designs; articulating their relevance; or identifying direct connections with the museum itself.
The strategic pillars––which we create for every client––devised for MoMA Design Store included "authority/expert", "forward thinking", "new/relevant", "exclusivity". These were used as filters for the messaging, ensuring that the stories told about each design item followed the same level of detail and historical accuracy as the museum itself.
The core ingredients of the store’s visual identity were reimagined in new and surprising ways through color and art direction, creating a thoughtful yet inquisitive personality, and a dynamic, vital, and witty tone of voice. Products were carefully segmented to target specific audiences, and promotions written in the first person garnered higher engagement.
The remixed identity enlivened the store environment, catalogs and website, holistically helping to educate customers and improve their shopping experience by delivering meaningful information. This allowed MoMA Design Store to retain its kudos as the place to shop collectible design.

Caran d’Ache writes its own story