Creative direction and storytelling for the re-opening campaign of the Waldorf Astoria New York. After ten years of renovation, the task was to reintroudce an icon to a modern New York City.
Cinematography: Sean Price Williams
Director: 91 Rules
Agency: Spherical
Like any good story or journey, there involves an element of personal transformation. The guest arrives at one of Hamak’s propreties in Mexico and Central America, and through Hamak’s alchemic universe, leaves changed. Thus Hamak Hospitality became “the storyteller” and its brand elements are inspired by personal transformation.
Hamak’s main symbol is a small circle that symbolizes the sun. The “sun” circle is a power source, a focal point, a point of departure, and our center of gravity. All of the individual properties revolve around the Hamak master brand.
Hamak’s brand ID intelligently uses “transparencies” as a way to symbolize the guest’s journey. When one begins their journey, the destination is unclear.
The route is semi-visible but shrouded in an exciting mystery. All that remains is discovery.
Each Hamak hotel is unique and rooted in the culture of that region, therefore— we build off of the master brand ID and add elements of “transformation” unique to that property. As an example, Hamak Todos Santos is built in a region where damiana plants grow wildy. Damiana is used in traditional alchemic ceremonies. So as to not be too obvious, the shapes of the plants are clipped into small “windows”, to symbolize a portal, and are used as texture and to add depth to the individual property’s brand ID.
The brand is for women who need a wardrobe that is elegant, unique, expressive, tailored—but never too precious.
The brand ID draws inspiration from old branding systems of companies with drive, that changed their industries—Porsche, Pirelli, Nasa and 80s Miyake. The brand is both futuristic and nostalgic, bringing us to the now.
Dahm House is an annually published fine art publication that explores universal topics through the lens of storytelling. It brings together a community of artists from all over the world and from every generation in order to engage their work in relation to and in juxtaposition to these philosophic and human themes.
Dahm House is created in Paris, France and is editorially and creatively directed by Catharine Dahm.
Dahm House is stocked in Paris, London, Milan, Tokyo, Seoul, New York and Los Angeles.
The Cooper’s primary logo mark serves as a portal, a gateway to the city and the sole hotel on the water welcoming you to it. The logo shows the iconic reeds that grow in the Cooper rive parting to reveal a C off in the distance. The C hangs over the mark as a symbol of the hotel’s position in the city, like the soft cresent moons that are often seen over water— it serves as a symbol of welcome for travelers.
The Cooper’s brand elements inlcude hand-painted watercolor papers that are used as textures throughout the website and print collateral. In addition, hand-made “sunprints” using local foliage add storytelling, symbolism and an even deeper connection with the region.
The color palette draws from the hotel and its surrounding areas. Creamy white like the Jasmine that can be smelled throughout the city. Rustic linen textures add depth. Gold foil symbolizes the sun reflecting on the water in front of the hotel, and of course we use shades of Cooper blue and other native neutrals.
The brand ID modernizes what a heritage brand can look like by taking family names to use as symbols of the brand, executive with bold and contemporary typographic treatments. À la famille.
The rare jewels used to create the pieces become brand symbols when extracted and used in playful graphic styling.
The ID’s “dots” symbols are representative of the generations that came before and will come after all revolving in unison to create new symbols for a contemporary moment but gard a certain “timeleness” necessary for any heritage brand.
The brand ID is powerful and symbolic, pulling from famous female archetypes and symbols in order to create a visually impactful yet timeless brand universe.
As the agency is at service of its clients, the brand ID needed to give an idea of the energy of its founders while being simple enough to not overshadow client work.
The horse ID is hand-drawn and is meant to resemeble famous cave paintings from Lascaux. The snake ID shows the skeleton of a snake as it provides a backbone for the clients and reclaims the serpent as a symbol of female energy and innovation.
that is going to save the world, now”
— Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds, “Nature Boy”
Dahm’s approach to creative is poetic, fresh, singular and strategically uncovers the core of a brand’s essence by developing, or extracting, its codes and positioning them as the connective tissue that binds all visual and written communications. Dahm’s background in writing and storytelling adds a depth to her visual creative work.
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Dahm and her work have been profiled in VOGUE, Harper’s Bazaar, NY Mag, Coveteur, Vogue Italia, Zoe Report, Town & Country, The Strategist, Women’s Wear Daily, and more.
CATHARINE DAHM est directrice artistique et consultante en stratégie de marque. Elle propose des services de stratégie créative, de direction artistique, de narration de marque, de positionnement de marque et de storytelling pour le développement de marques dans les secteurs du luxe, de l'hôtellerie et de l'immobilier.
L'approche créative de Catherine Dahm est poétique, originale et unique. Elle révèle stratégiquement l'essence même d'une marque en développant ou en extrayant ses codes et en les positionnant comme le tissu conjonctif qui relie toutes les communications visuelles et écrites. L'expérience de Catherine Dahm dans l'écriture et le storytelling ajoute de la profondeur à son travail créatif visuel.
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Dahm et son travail ont été présentés dans VOGUE, Harper's Bazaar, NY Mag, Coveteur, Vogue Italia, Zoe Report, Town & Country, The Strategist, Women's Wear Daily, etc.
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Get in touch.
catdahm@gmail.com