You’re familiar with us already — for over 14 years you’ve seen our branding and marketing work on the web, on buses, on buildings, heard it on the radio, and mentioned it to friends. We use innovative ideas and powerful design to get businesses working harder than ever before.
From established corporate institutions to up-and-coming entrepreneurs, professionals hire us to help solve their business problems and improve sales.
We do this by making a clear, unbiased examination of an organization’s strengths and weaknesses, and using the insights we gather to write a brand and marketing strategy. Those ideas are combined with clever design, which adds up to a powerful brand.
And a strong brand means strong sales.
It’s hard work building a business, but it’s even more work running a business that’s enjoying unprecedented growth. We’re ready when you are.
The work keeps coming and we continue to welcome new clients and expand current relationships! For this we are starting to look for some additional help around the office.
We are looking for a Print Production Designer and a WordPress Developer/Designer. Click for more.
In addition to the record, feedback has been monstrously positive! We like to think that Icky the Troll, discovered in the remote wilderness of Northern Manitoba by Velocity senior designer Colette Boisvert, may have had a hand in boosting attendance. How? Troll magic.
Here’s a shot of Icky with Colette (left) and Creative Director Karla Burr (right).
Icky loves the ladies.
Safeway Boo at the Zoo runs till Sunday, October 30.
The name Pembina is derived from the French Canadian name for the berry of the viburnum trilobum or Highbush Cranberry. Pembina Highway* takes it name from the old Pembina Trail, which led from what we now call Winnipeg to Fort Pembina, a fur trading post run by the North West Company.
VELOCITYWG #3 is “Pembina Strip” by Velocity Interactive Designer, Lee Froese.
Pembina Strip is roughly the area north of Bishop Grandin and south of Chevrier Boulevard and Crescent Drive. It’s a small area of the city, and not one that most Winnipeggers would normally consider iconic or representative of the city, or talk about with out-of-towners.
But it’s not without its charms. Home to Celebrations Dinner Theatre, numerous bars and ethnic restaurants, apartment blocks, shops and amenities, it’s a bustling community at the crossroads of two major transportation arteries, and minutes from the University of Manitoba.
Lee’s comments:
The logo came out looking old-timey and that’s what I wanted. It’s a tip of the hat to the Pembina Trail and the early settlers using horse-drawn carriages.
Enjoy a coffee, a bubble tea, or a beer at one of the local pubs, take a walk through Plaza Drive Park, hangout dockside at the Pony Corral, or get a late night slice of pie.
Although personally, I miss the old Cinema City.
VELOCITYWG is a weekly design project: simple exercises in unfettered creativity with a common theme that’s near and dear to our hearts: celebrating the streets, suburbs, and cityscape of Manitoba’s capital.
VELOCITYWG, Rebranding One Great City, continues next week.
Comments? jay@velocitybranding.com
*Added fun fact: Just across the street from the Round Table near Pembina and Taylor, is a nifty little plaque commemorating Winnipeg’s 1974 centennial, and the 75th anniversary of the Pine to Palm Highway.
With the completion of Highway 75 (Lord Selkirk Highway) in 1899, the first continuous roadway opened from Winnipeg to New Orleans, Louisiana, dubbed the “Pine to Palm Highway” — no doubt because in those days, New Orleans has an abundance of palm trees, and Winnipeg had a number of wealthy pine-flavoured candy manufacturing barons with the surname “Pine.”
Really. Look it up.
It’s no secret that I love history, and I love to get lost in the Manitoba Historical Society’s online archives. Researching today’s entry, I discovered this little gem in reference to Crescentwood:
“Socially, Winnipeg takes the palm. The city has scores of palatial mansions inhabited by wealthy men of plain, practical ideas, whose greatest aim is the work of building up commercially, industrially, socially and morally the city they live in. No claim can be made in Winnipeg for austere, alleged saints. The people are too active and practical for that.” — An unnamed writer, 1903
VELOCITYWG #2 is “Crescentwood” by Velocity Senior Designer, Colette Boisvert.
Founded as a community in the 1890s, Crescentwood is named for the home of John Henry Munson, owner of the largest lot on the Assiniboine River at the time, and developed by C.H. Enderton.
From the outset, Crescentwood was deemed the best place in Winnipeg to live, and many of the city’s elite emigrated from their homes and mansions in the South Broadway-Assiniboine area to the new suburb.
If Winnipeg’s Downtown has traditionally been the city’s engine of commerce, then the steering wheel has definitely been Crescentwood. Some of the city’s most famous business leaders, politicians and luminaries lived and grew up in Crescentwood. Names like Ashdown, Richardson, Roblin, and more, crop up continuously as you read about the area’s history.
Colette’s comment on the wordmark: “I wanted it to look expensive.”
Indeed. Home to some of the finest private residences in the city, Crescentwood continues to be the neighbourhood of choice for (in no particular order) the active, the practical, and the wealthy.
Grab a coffee at Stella’s on Sherbrook, and take a stroll across the Maryland Bridge, south on Wellington to Munson Park. Then loop around at Grosvenor to Ruskin Row, and watch the leaves fall from a bench in Enderton Park. No better way to spend a weekend afternoon.
Crescentwood in autumn takes the palm.
VELOCITYWG is a weekly design project: simple exercises in unfettered creativity with a common theme that’s near and dear to our hearts: celebrating the streets, suburbs, and cityscape of Manitoba’s capital.
VELOCITYWG, Rebranding One Great City, continues next week.
Comments? jay@velocitybranding.com
As mentioned on Friday, VELOCITYWG is our new, weekly design project: simple exercises in unfettered creativity with a common theme that’s near and dear to our hearts: celebrating the streets, suburbs, and cityscape of Manitoba’s capital.
Our first entry is “St. Norbert” by Velocity Creative Director, Karla Burr.
Winnipeg’s southernmost neighbourhood, St. Norbert is named for the first Bishop of St. Boniface, Joseph-Norbert Provencher, home to the extremely popular St. Norbert Farmers’ Market, and landmarks such as the Trappist Monastery, Aisle Richot, and the St. Norbert Catholic Parish.
Karla’s comments:
I grew up very near to St. Norbert, and as teenagers we would go and hang out at the ruins, maybe do some underage drinking maybe enjoy a soda and discuss the works of Proust. So naturally, when I think of St. Norbert, I think of the Trappist Monastery — the image in my mind of a summer evening with the warm sun hitting the face at the golden hour.
I thought of basing the design on the Farmer’s Market, as this is one of my favorite things in the city (as some of you know, I’m the Foursquare Mayor of it). But I think that the Monastery is truer to the history of St. Norbert — especially the french histoire.
So my logo is inspired by the Trappist Monastery’s remaining front facade. The O creates the hole where the rosary window once was.
St. Norbert is a bastion of French-Canadian culture, with a strong multicultural presence that’s typical of Winnipeg. Be sure to try some fresh spring rolls, vinatarta, or an empanada at the Market, and then check out the Buddhist Pagoda behind the St. Norbert Arts Centre.
VELOCITYWG, Rebranding One Great City, continues later this week.
Comments? jay@velocitybranding.com