Vanessa Smith || Creative Designer
Vanessa Smith || Creative Designer
Brand identity for Cartographica, an atelier of genuine (and tastefully reproduced) maps and artefacts of a bygone era.
Cartographica is Wellington’s specialist in genuine antique maps and prints. Located above the Botanic Gardens, it’s setting is lush, peaceful and exudes an old world charm. Stepping into the gallery is like transporting yourself into a bygone era – one of adventure, discovery and science all beautifully rendered and preserved upon pages of exquisite artistic wonder.
In addition to an impressive collection of maps, Cartographica offers fine reproductions of classic New Zealand artworks, and specimen drawings of insects and associated flora and fauna.
“Cartographica sought an identity that not only told the story of what it offers, but also connected with an audience through their imagination, dispelling any ‘stuffy’ preconceptions about maps and antiques.”
The brand direction honours the almost-forgotten art form of traditional map making and heroes a particular tool of the Cartography trade. The elegant lines of an antique drafting compass serves to directly bring literal meaning to the name and also helps create the name itself.
Partnered with the precise and historic Trajan font, the drafting compass features as a stylised ‘A’ in the brand name, making for a distinctive word mark conveying the ‘specialist’ nature of Cartographica’s business.
A colour palette of an almost-black charcoal, a deep golden bronze and a warm white palette adds to the timelessness of this elegant direction. Olde worlde maps and artworks were also available to use as additional 'swatches', adding depth, texture and dimension to an otherwise netural palette. These swatches also helped to strengthen Cartographica's offering by showing direct examples of its stock within gallery signage and stationery.
The positioning line, ‘Discover and Treasure’, can be interpreted in multiple ways; ‘Discover’ can be linked to the way maps are literally records of the discoveries our predecessors have made, or the way in which maps are used as a tool to discover and also from the angle that people are invited to come in and discover something within the walls of Cartographica. ‘Treasure’ can relate to tales of lost treasure at sea, or, more importantly, to finding/discovering something exquisite at Cartographica to keep for yourself or gift to another to treasure for time to come.
The brand was rolled out over stationery items and stamps as well as key signage for the gallery exterior and Cartographica's presence at public markets.