Future of Cities Coalition

The brief

Future of Cities is a pan-European coalition bringing industry, policymakers, academics and local communities together on housing, tourism and urban livability. It needed an identity that would catch the eye of EU policymakers, feel sophisticated yet fresh and collaborative, and be clearly its own: distinct from Airbnb and from organisations already active in the space, such as Eurocities and Housing Europe.

The constraints were practical as well as visual: colour, black-and-white and mark-only logo versions, fonts the coalition’s team could use in Word, and assets ready for social media. The timeline was tight, with the identity due by the end of November so content and merchandise could begin, the website by mid-January, and launch in March.

My role

Brand identity, logo system, guidelines, and website design and development on Ghost. I scoped the engagement against a comparable alliance project and planned the work around fast, disciplined review cycles to meet the launch date.

Approach

• Discovery: explored the idea of overlap: cities, sectors and communities meeting. That led to translucent shapes that blend where they intersect.
• Exploration: tested several directions, from skyline and data-bar marks to pixel grids and rings, against the brief before converging on one.
• The mark: an FOC monogram set over three overlapping forms, with full-colour, inverse, monochrome, single-colour, badge, horizontal and reduced versions, plus clear-space rules.
• Typography: Poppins for display paired with PT Serif for reading. Both are free and install in Word, so the team can produce on-brand documents themselves.
• Colour: a palette of pink, coral, yellow and mint tones designed to mix where they overlap, echoing the idea of collaboration.
• AI-assisted content strategy: used AI to align the audience personas, from EU policymakers to housing, tourism and urban-development stakeholders, and to structure the site’s content for SEO, with the coalition’s manifesto as the reference for its voice.
• AI-assisted build: connected the approved UX and UI designs in Figma to Cursor via MCP, then used it to build a custom Ghost theme that carries the brand guidelines’ design language through to the live site.
• Delivery: a logo package organised by use (standard, horizontal, icon, inline, social and web navigation), social banners, a roll-up banner and the website.

Outcome

The identity was delivered in time for content and merchandise production, and the coalition launched with a complete brand system and website at futureofcities.eu.