Branding & Website
Client: Pembina Institute
Year: 2019
Agency: Hamazaki Wong Marketing Group

Role
Art & Visual Direction
Client & Project Management
Branding Development
Website Planning & Development

Business Alliance for a Clean Economy is an initiative of the Pembina Institute that brings businesses together as a network and ensures strong climate and clean energy policies are realized. In celebration of the successful push for transparency on B.C. climate legislation and before meeting with B.C. Premier John Horgan, the network was looking to establish a new name and brand.

The ask was to develop a brand to successfully portray the network’s vision and philosophy, including naming, logo design and brand guidelines and website. The brand needed to be strong, forward-thinking, appropriate for the clean economy industry and suitable for a corporate.

The name Catalyst Business Alliance was developed in a collaborative effort by the creative and accounts team and was derived from the network’s 3 goals: champion, engage and inspire. Catalyst is a term that is simple, bold and strong. It perfectly represented the forward-thinking and forward-motion attitude of the brand.

I took the qualities from the name and created a logomark that was formed by simple lines/stripes. The initial of Catalyst, the letter ‘C’, was on the left side and a forward-moving right arrow was on the right side. The three stripes represented the network and the strength through joint forces. And it allowed me to create a bold graphic without looking too heavy. The hexagonal shape with the flat edge at the bottom indicated stability and balance. The colours used were bright blue and deep purple, with blue representing technology and a bright future, and purple representing wisdom and creativity. The gradient shifts between the two colours further emphasized the forward-moving motion.

A simple and modern typeface with stylized slanted edges was selected to work with the logomark. Using the combination of bright blue and deep purple on the logotype, I was able to emphasize the word ‘Catalyst’ in the name while keeping the whole name in the same font size. An alternate version of the logo with the names stacked was created for usage when usable space is limited.

The branding elements created for the logomark are carried over and used as visual elements for the website. The hexagonal shape of the logo was used on the website to hold visual graphics and the clean and recognizable colours of bright blue and deep purple were used to highlight various important sections.

This brand development project was well-received by the client and all partners. It well-represented Catalyst Business Alliance brand in front of the B.C. Premier and all the various media, it was a major success!