Greenhouse

The effects of climate change are becoming rapidly evident. Higher temperatures, prolonged natural disasters and rising sea levels forecast for the coming decades. However, with these pressing issues come new opportunities for growth and innovation. The rapidly growing climate-focused technology sector, or ‘climate-tech,’ is seen as the solution to mitigating the lasting effects of our changing climate, with climate-tech innovation giving rise to entirely new industries that may well determine the future of our planet.

Located in Sydney’s brand new Salesforce Tower and created by Venture Capital group Investible, Greenhouse is an innovation ecosystem dedicated to accelerating the collaboration, adoption and impact of climate technologies on a global scale. Their core focus is addressing the issues and opportunities introduced by Climate Change through new climate-tech solutions. As part of a government initiative with the City of Sydney, Greenhouse provides affordable space for Australian scaleups to accelerate their expansion and connect with like-minded groups, investors and partners across the globe. Their vision being to unite multidisciplinary knowledge and accelerate the businesses that will help us respond to pressing climate challenges and capitalise on the opportunities therein.

Working with key stakeholders of the Investible team, TOAST was engaged to strategically design Greenhouse’s innovative brand identity, creating a footprint that will generate awareness and boost global consideration for its climate-tech offerings. The Greenhouse brand needed to be respected by diverse key stakeholders and gain credibility among corporate companies - their number one key stakeholder for success. 

Through fostering a culture formed on disruption, Greenhouse endeavours to create & strengthen new ideas, connections and businesses. It is a place for growth and has a mission to provide climate-focused technology companies with the right expertise and connections to scale. TOAST’s brand footprint and visual identity needed to harness this innovative power and unwavering ambition - and communicate it on a global scale. 

Strategic industry analysis, research and stakeholder workshops informed Greenhouse’s overall brand footprint, building a brand that is optimised for growth and ingrained with modernity and creativity.

Connecting groups, companies and visions in a multidisciplinary ecosystem, Greenhouse introduces the potential to create vast change through the immense power that is harnessed when working together. For Greenhouse, this comes to life through the power of ‘co-innovation’. Reflecting this core brand value, TOAST crafted the tagline “Connected. We co-innovate for climate action,” capturing their brand purpose of connecting the dots between people, ideas, and ultimately, countries, to co-create innovative solutions that will mitigate the effects of climate change.

We mirrored their highly prolific, climate-focused world in a visual identity that draws inspiration from the cycle of the sun, the ‘warming stripes’ climate barcode and soft colour gradients within nature. Our design concept reflects the innate power within our natural, interconnected ecosystem and translates it into the collaborative community that Greenhouse fosters.

Mirroring the agility and creativity within the business itself, the Greenhouse branding suite is versatile and highly dynamic. To reflect the ‘revolutionary’ approach of the brand, we utilised a free form colour gradient across the logotype and brand iconography. This gradient, with each colour connecting to ‘co-create’ something new, reflects Greenhouse’s unstructured, creative approach to tackling climate issues. Complementing this, a halftone effect is applied across the brand, a graphic approach which reflects the ‘connecting the dots’ culture within Greenhouse and the myriad elements which make up its purpose, reach and impact.

Beyond the visual territory, we sought to imbue their brand values across all aspects of the Greenhouse identity, exploring eco-fonts and climate-focused digital design.

An eco-font minimises the consumption of ink and paper in print applications, and can reduce power usage by 30% in digital applications on Organic LED screens (increased further in combination with black backgrounds). Gilroy was selected as the Greenhouse typeface. Its sans-serif structure connotes modernity and innovation whilst its compact, clean line design equates to smaller file storage and fewer pixels when digitally presented. The introduction of an eco-font to Greenhouse’s branding suite allows for a holistic representation of their brand values and emphasises the forward-thinking approach of their business.

With understanding of the interrelationship between Masterbrand and a series of supporting programs and venues, a brand architecture was devised by TOAST and executed across all sub-brands. The signature colour gradient element of the Greenhouse masterbrand logo then became the common visual thread to unite a series of sub-brands, collaborating to execute the organisation’s overall mission, with verticals including a climate tech hub, commercialisation booster ‘Amped’, the ‘Greenhouse Challenge’ program, and branding for climate supporters and venture capital investors.