Mark & Layout — C'est La V

Logo

Two marks. The wordmark for all primary touchpoints: website, marketing, print. The logomark (V mark) for social media, in-product, and when the wordmark falls below minimum size.

Color. Leather or Cotton only. Never in a brand color. Always on a transparent background, never inside a filled box.

Minimum sizes. Wordmark: 80px digital, 25mm print. Logomark: 24px digital, 8mm print.

Never distorted, rotated, recolored, filtered, or recreated in plain text.

Wordmark · Leather on Cotton

Wordmark · Cotton on Leather

Logomark · Leather on Parchment

Logomark · Cotton on Leather

Clear space rule

= cap height of V

Logomark · Cotton on Leather

Clear space rule

= cap height of V

Clear space all sides = cap height of V

Clear space = half mark height

Good Leather on Cotton, Cotton on Leather. Leather on Parchment. Cotton on any dark surface.

Bad Logo in any brand color. On a filled color block. Below minimum size. Recreated in a typeface.

Motion

Motion is a brand register, not a production afterthought. These principles apply to all animated Visualist output.

Construct,
never reveal

The motif forms always build from their origin. The axes draw outward from the origin point. The curve grows from its base to its apex, accelerating. The X forms from the center outward. Nothing fades in complete.

Speed maps
to attribute

Axes: slow and weighted. Trustworthy. Grounded, deliberate, earned. Curve: ease-in, steepening toward apex. Dynamic. Building with momentum: accelerating, not constant. X: quick and decisive. Refined. The synthesis moment arriving precisely.

Nodes bloom
individually

Each node scales to ~120% then settles to final size over ~500ms, ease-out-back timing. They never appear as a group reveal. The field builds the way a real graph builds: one data point at a time.

Loops are
mid-accumulation

An animated node field should always be building, never complete. Completion implies the graph has stopped growing. The graph never stops growing.

Transitions
use the forms

Transitions between sections or states use the motif forms as structural connectors where appropriate: axes establishing new ground, the curve connecting two moments, rather than generic fades or slides.

Construction demo: loops mid-accumulation

Layout and composition

Space is the primary tool

Generous margins, generous padding. A cramped layout contradicts the brand's values. When a layout feels incomplete, the answer is to remove something.

One center of gravity. Every composition has one hero element. Everything else serves it. When two elements compete, one is wrong.

Build lower-left to upper-right. Place the heaviest visual element at the lower-left: a large headline, a product surface, or a strong typographic anchor. Let negative space open toward the upper-right. A composition where every element is equidistant from the edges has no direction and no visual weight.

Left-align body text, labels, and captions always. Center alignment is for display headlines only, when scale justifies it.

Default to offset, not symmetric. Symmetry reads as formal and generic. Offset compositions feel authored.

No decorative structure. No dividers, rules, flourishes, or ornamental borders. White space and type scale carry all structure. Functional borders (card edges, UI borders) are permitted.

Asymmetric composition

The more you
work, the smarter
Vai gets.

Every decision you make in Visualist adds to your taste graph. Over time, Vai understands how you think.

What the brand never does

Gradients of any kind

Pure white (#FFFFFF) or pure black (#000000)

Drop shadows on type

Glassmorphism or frosted glass effects

More than one core brand color in a single non-social composition

Accent colors as backgrounds or dominant surfaces

Tartuffo below 40px

Roboto Mono headlines in lowercase

Bold weight as a substitute for scale hierarchy

More than three typefaces in a single composition

Decorative dividers, rules, or flourishes

Centered body text

Logo in any color other than Leather or Cotton

Logo on a filled color block

The motif used as decorative wallpaper

Assets composited on top of photography

Heavy photographic filters or color grading

Emojis used as design elements