In 2012, I co-founded Powerplant, an independent, full-service branding and creative agency with offices in San Francisco and San Diego. Powerplant empowers innovative companies to initiate positive social and environmental change through great design and brand strategy. Our name, Powerplant, points to the empowering and electrifying nature of our work and also seeks to challenge conventional notions of power generation.
Brand Identity
It is an unique challenge to brand your own agency. In some ways, the process is not unlike client-driven projects—yet, there is a level of intimacy that can complicate things. This can draw out the decision-making and design process. So, we enlisted the help of Robert Finkel, occasional collaborator and baddass graphic designer, to help with us on our visual identity.
I provided creative direction and designed the typography system, while Robert skillfully handled the rest—from the logo, to the color palette, and stationery system.
Business cards were printed with nontoxic ink on 100% post-consumer recycled chipboard to reinforce the attribute value of doing less with more.
Web Design and Development
Once the identity was locked down, I handled all aspects of the design and development of Powerplant's marketing site. After agreement was reached on wireframes and content strategy, the site was designed and developed using CodeKit to handle a lot of the fussy details. Finally, page templates were integrated into a Craft CMS for highly flexible and extensible content management.
View the live site at www.wearepowerplant.com
