12.08.08

California Academy of Sciences identity

Identity, Education

The California Academy of Sciences, located in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park, reopened in an iconic new building designed by the Pritzker Prize-winning architect Renzo Piano. The $488 million, all-green, LEED® Platinum Certified building not only represents a new chapter in the institution’s long history, but celebrates a new kind of museum experience—dynamic, thriving, interconnected and all about the natural world. It is, uniquely, a natural history museum, aquarium, planetarium and four-story rainforest, all under one living roof.

The San Francisco office of Pentagram designed the identity, environmental graphics and collateral print materials that rebrand the institution as a vibrant, living museum. But it’s the identity, described as The Fabric of Life and inspired by the organic curves of the building’s roof, that underscores every component of the project. Radiating outward from a center oculus, the symbol appears to be growing—an interpretation of the cyclical and dynamic nature of the natural sciences. Based on the Whitney typeface by Hoefler & Frere-Jones, the customized logotype grounds the symbol, echoing the horizontal format of the building. The colors of the symbol speak specifically to the Academy’s location and mission: international orange (the color of the Golden Gate Bridge) is strongly connected to San Francisco  and the architectural details inside the building; green represents life and the natural world; and gray represents the city’s famous fog and the concrete building (and its LEED® Platinum-level rating).

Kit Hinrichs, partner-in-charge; Laura Scott, associate.

pentagram.comwww.calacademy.org