Center for Language Sciences
CLS: A New Voice
Brand Revival: Breathing Life into the Language Sciences
SERVICES
Brand Identity Design
In November 2025, the University of Rochester rebranded and they moved from a house of brands to a branded house. All schools and centers are no longer permitted to use individual branding. :(
The primary objective was to create a versatile brand that works across digital channels and future merchandise, including consistent templates for lecture series and posters. Equally important was launching a unified visual presence on Instagram and LinkedIn to engage the CLS community and external partners, all while asserting a personality that stands out in the field of natural language.
At the outset of this project, CLS lacked a clear visual voice and had an audience largely siloed in linguistics. The center needed to signal its renewed leadership and its ambition to serve an interdisciplinary language sciences community. My challenge was to create a visual identity that both broke free from linguistic clichés and resonated across diverse fields of language sciences, while honoring the center’s heritage on campus. I began with broad sketching and ideation across multiple visual territories. From there, I refined the mark and created custom typography.
Reposition CLS from a linguistics silo to an interdisciplinary hub by building a brand that invites and reflects collaboration across the language sciences community.
