Wildlife Conservation Society gets new identity ahead of global conservation plan
The Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) has implemented a new identity and brand as it embarks on a new strategy aimed at conserving the world’s largest wild places in 15 priority regions.
WCS, which is based at the Bronx Zoo in New York, worked with Pentagram on the re-brand to create a design that would powerfully communicate its mission and to help it build a wildlife movement around the globe.
At the same time, the branding had to incorporate the five parks WCS manages – the Bronx Zoo, Central Park Zoo, Prospect Park, Queens Zoo and New York Aquarium – which are visited by 4 million people annually and are an important part of what WCS is all about: many children have their first experience with wildlife at the zoos, setting them on a lifelong course of caring about animals.
The designers first helped the organisation refine its brand strategy with a statement to connect all of its initiatives with the tagline ‘We stand for wildlife’. The new identity visualises this promise with a stylised ‘W’. Made of simple geometry, the mark can project a wide range of expressions, from serious to lively and can appear in linear form or contain different colours and images of animals.
The full-colour version of the symbol appears in five shades of green and blue that reference the land, skies and seas where animals live. Different colours can also be used to represent the various parks and programs.