Every February, Elemental brings the leaders of its portfolio companies to Kahuku for a few days out of the office together. The 2025 program ran as two events back to back: a cohort kickoff on the 10th and 11th, then the CEO & Leadership Summit from the 11th through the 14th. The days are built for honest conversations about the hard parts of building a company, market intel traded between founders, real community engagement, and enough room to recharge.
The identity had to hold both events as one week, move from a mailed invitation to a website to signage on the lawn, and speak to a room of people who know exactly how volatile this work is. Founders in climate tech live the swings: a policy shifts, a round closes, a pilot fails, a first plant breaks ground. My goal was an identity that embraces that rhythm instead of smoothing it over.
The system is built on tides. Their ebb and flow mirrors the ups and downs of running a climate company, so instead of drawing a decorative wave I pulled the shapes from real tidal charts for the region, keyed to the beach's exposure, the time of year, and the moon cycle over the event dates. Every curve on the page is an actual tide from that week, which means the motif carries information and not just mood: the same shape works as a graphic, a photo mask, and a grid unit without ever repeating exactly.
From there the tide ran through everything. The February calendar sets each day as its own tidal curve topped with a moon-phase marker, so a month of dates reads as one rhythm rather than a grid. The wave becomes a mask for the photography, blue-duotone North Shore landscapes, the welcome tent on the grass, founders out in the field, and a frame for the heavy blue display type that anchors the mailer and the site. One headline says the idea out loud, "change is the only constant," set over a wave the size of the page. The whole thing stays keyed to one place and one week: the tides off Kahuku, the moon above them, the founders on the grass below.