Free Wheels OdV Rebranding
A complete rebranding project, from logo to merchandising.
The Story
The onlus’ founder, Pietro, is a born leader and a person that puts his interior strenght in every word and every action he performs. Free Wheels Onlus (now Free Wheels OdV) was born after he went head-first in a journey that seemed impossible for others: completing the Camino de Santiago in wheelchair, not only once but twice, in 2014 and 2015.
After such an eye-opening, unique experience, it was time to let other people know that Pilgrimage Routes, and Routes in general, can be mapped out and done by travelers with different types of disabilities. Thus, the real Journey began for him and the Free Wheels' team, and today they count more than 6 Routes completely mapped and available to other travelers.
Re-branding Identity: Solution and Process
It was crucial to convey Pietro's strength throughout the new brand identity and website, but also giving all the team members their importance.
The non-profit's pillar values (Effort, People, Balance) have a universal meaning, so we started from there. Giving an institutional, stable shape to those values and a colour for each of them was the right solution for this project. The bond that links these values is strong in Free Wheels, so we made it visual in the logo as the bond between the letters, sustaining its three values-colours.
The Logo
Starting from a simple module (half of the horizontal line from the "w" letter from ArcherPro font), we constructed the rest of the logo around it. We reduced the kerning between the two letters until they were touching each other, like giving a hand to one another. And just above the strong and safe letters, the three pillar values-colours appear.
Anthrax grey, as heavy as the Effort Pietro put in his journey.
Turquoise, like waves in an ocean of People, continuously coming back to the project.
Orange, like the warmth the travelers feel when they know they have reached their inner Balance.
From that point onwards, communicating with Pietro about the mood of the branding felt like the easiest task. We knew that this was the way. I went a step further: suggesting the creation of some goods to be given before the start of the journey for each traveller affiliated to Free Wheels was a successful idea. We didn't over-complicated the process, though: no overproduction of goods was necessary, so we could focus better on the mission and on other assets.
Website and App
Of course, rebranding Free Wheels' identity meant not only go for printed media, but for digital media as well.
Especially, we wanted to create seamless interaction between their website and a specific app, built so that it could manage both a Personal Account area and the Journey Maps that Free Wheels have already created in these years.
(website prototype coming soon)
Thanks for watching!
