Fresh From The Field — The Climate Action Conference - By Cultigraphy

Fresh From The Field — The Climate Action Conference – By Cultigraphy

Fresh from the Field is a weekly article series sharing the fresh and inspiring work of our Aotearoa New Zealand Design Assembly community.

Kicking off with a simple sentiment: anything but boring, Cultigraphy share their recent design work for The Climate Action Conference.

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The brief

Following the devastation caused by the Auckland Floods and Cyclone Gabrielle, it is more crucial than ever that we fight for a safe climate future. The Climate Action Conference is a youth-for-youth organisation that aims to teach rangatahi about actions they can take to combat climate change. The inaugural conference, held over May 6th-7th 2023 at The University of Auckland, enabled youth from ages 13-24 to learn from expert speakers and hands-on workshops, connect with like-minded peers, and take action on the most pressing environmental challenges of our time.

The founder, Dylan Chand, approached Cultigraphy in November 2022 for our non-profit event partnership. His brief was open, essentially giving us free rein to design any way we thought best. The core goal we identified for the brand development was to help reignite motivation and regenerate hope in rangatahi.

The Design Response

Our design response was kicked off with a simple sentiment: anything but boring. We wanted to cut through the formal, corporate genre of conferences to hook the attention of rangatahi, energise them through a fairly lengthy 9am-5pm double day event, and amplify the message: no matter your age, ethnicity, or income, let’s go make a difference. Striking the right balance between Generation Z and Tāmaki Makaurau’s established climate groups was crucial; we wanted the brand to speak directly to youth and match their loud, unabashed energy, while maintaining a level of professionalism for grant funders and organisations.

The entire brand is catalysed by a constant urge to move towards a better future. Everything stretches or tilts upwards! The brandmark is a trio of arrows, subtly stylised as a tree—repeatable, scalable, and opacity-changeable, the arrows are a key driving mechanism across all touchpoints. The colour palette is clean, refreshing gradients of ocean-forest-sky, injected with shots of ‘Gen Z’ colours. As the designer it was a blast to go full throttle with such in-your-face shades, which we feel perfectly captures the activism spirit of our youth.

Versatility and ease of use was important when designing the brand ecosystem, because the conference team needed to create their own social marketing materials beyond our starter templates. We created a digital kit of stickers with fun emoji-inspired iconography which could be slapped on anything by the team; from Instagram posts, their website, to physical banners & posters. We were chuffed to see the creative, fresh ways the team applied their design assets. Overall, a super fun and inspiring initiative that we’re glad to have pitched in as an event partner and designer!