Asha: Guest lecture

Yesterday we had a brilliant and inspiring guest lecture - Mark Steen from Asha, a "London design studio, outside of London." (Cheltenham). They have worked on a wide variety of projects, big and small, which you can check out on the website. But the project that really stood out for me was their 'brand refresh of' WWF.

"The world’s leading conservation organisation have been working with ArthurSteenHorneAdamson in a global brand refresh, aiming to clarify the public's understanding of the breadth of its work."

WWF is a worldwide known environmental organisation with its iconic panda logo. But the panda was all it was know for, "Noone really knows what it [WWF] is for." Which is where Asha came in.

One of the key things that Mark kept stressing was the importance in separating the science and emotion - science being the facts and figures, and emotion - the cute cuddly toy animals. And it's the sciencey side that I really liked, how the facts and figures are displayed so clean and simply.

"WWF is a science-led organisation, but it is important to recognise that the emotional aspect of what they do helps them to engage with a wider audience. To ensure their science-led approach is given appropriate emphasis, and to enable WWF audiences to understand and engage with the science quickly, ASHA developed a signature style for portraying scientific information."


Asha even designed a new condensed typeface specifically for WWF.

Really great stuff. The sort of thing I'd like to be a part of, something meaningful - science, environmental, geography, information etc.