One of the greatest marketing challenges confronted by large law firms is achieving consensus among many diverse practices and partners. Our discovery process revealed redundancy in materials, a lack of consistent presentation and a need to contemporize the visual approach. Colloquially speaking, partners wanted to convey, ‘This is not your grandfather’s law firm.’ Our solution was to literally reframe the firm for a new generation using bright bold color, translucent overlays and sans-serif fonts.

There was an initial reluctance to fully move away from the firm’s existing logo. We began a process of transition by simply creating a consistent placement and usage style for the name, typeset in News Gothic. Over time the typesetting was custom-kerned with a ligature and adopted firm-wide as a logo word mark.

The system was adopted worldwide for materials as diverse as firm annual reports, newsletters, practice area brochures, paper correspondence, folders, pitch decks, and of course, the website. Over time, and through personnel changes, the grid and color palettes evolved from the original bold palette to a softer, more analogous system. Yet, the logo and typographic system remained consistent.

In addition to the primary communication system we created suites of materials that fell outside of the rules. These included recruiting programs, celebratory announcements and holiday greetings.

At every step along the way, we worked side-by-side with the CMO at Dechert. Our collaboration involved countless stakeholder interviews and workshops. Together we crafted a system to serve the needs of a growing, global organization and present its relevance in a changing business landscape.