Rebranding Yearn, consistency from chaos.

One of the core principles that lies at the heart of Yearn is a healthy respect for chaos. After all, Yearn was born from chaos. A big bang moment, a zero to one kinetic super collision of creativity that birthed a whole new type of yield aggregator. While some fear chaos, we know it can create new ideas and even spawn whole industries.

‘Brand’ does not sit comfortably with chaos. Brand asks for consistency, it demands structure and comes to the table with a manila folder of best practices tucked neatly under its arm.

How can a headless organization even be condensed into one singular brand? It can’t. It’s a contradiction.

Contradictions, what are they good for, absolutely everything.

We think of contradictions as inconsistencies. Signs that something isn’t quite aligned correctly. But what if contradictions actually indicated healthy frictions. Intriguing tensions that only exist on the edge of new frontiers. When ideas are being pushed into places they have not been before.

Yearn is full of contradictions. How could a polymorphous and headless entity be anything else? But rather than try and post rationalize Yearn’s contradictions into something neat, palatable and easy to work with — we instead decided to lean into the contradictions that make Yearn unique.

After dozens of core contributor interviews, we unearthed four key aspects of Yearn. Who we are. What we do. How it feels. And Why we do it. Unsurprisingly, the answers to these questions fueled the flames of Yearn’s burning contradictions.

These four productive tensions then became guiding statements.

The future of finance won’t belong to anybody, but everybody.

Reams have been written on the potential DeFi has to contribute to material change in the world. We don’t need to retread well worn ground. It’s this belief that drives everything we do at Yearn; that the future of finance won’t belong to anyone, but everyone.

Therefore we thought less in terms of a singular design, but more in terms of design structures. A flexible, modular approach that would allow us to speak to different audiences in ways that make most sense to them. DeFi whales speak a different language to Tradfi funds, and everyday savers communicate differently than web3 builders.

As Yearn grows, so will who we want to communicate with, and how we want to speak to them.

New logo, who dis?

While our old logo was much loved (legend has it Andre created it in Paint), we felt it needed a refresh. Our new symbol seems to evoke different feelings in different people, some see a steady foundation, others a moat or protective aura, or perhaps a yield funnel into a yield pond (or maybe that’s just us). Whatever you see, our new logo offers more dimensionality, works better in different media spots and gives the optionality needed for a modular design system.

Yearn’s glow up.

Everyone knows Yearn is blue. But so are half the planet’s corporations (side eye emoji). While blue will remain our primary color, we’ve expanded our color palette to be more expressive. There is an explosion of creative energy bubbling at the heart of DeFi and simply having one primary color does not do that justice.

Write code, talk human.

DeFi sits on the bleeding edge of crypto, and as such it often comes across as cold, technical and unapproachable to many. This is likely fine for current DeFi users, but will need to change as our industry grows and we start to onboard the next wave of users.

Aeonik, our new typeface, is purposeful, elegant and timeless in design. We hope it evokes something beautiful for our current users, and something familiar for our future ones.

This sentiment is also reflected in our new tagline. A purpose for Yearn that is bigger than mere yield aggregation and speaks to the DAOs grander mission. In line with our modular approach, this sign off can change and flex to accommodate different product or audience messaging.

How It All Comes Together.

Ok, enough longwinded conceptual prose waxing lyrical about the constituent parts of Yearn’s new brand. Let’s see how it all comes together with some nice pictures.

Yearn was born into a new world. And for most of its existence to date it has been building a space for itself in this new world. Building out yield aggregation as a core DeFi primitive has take priority over the softer sciences of design and art direction. However as DeFi continues to grow it is clear that good design will play an increasingly important role in how we connect with and onboard the next wave of users to this alternate financial system.

Launching this rebrand is just the start of its journey, and we’re excited to see how it grows and evolves as we roll it out across Yearn’s products, existing and new.

You can see (and use) all our new assets in their full glory at: https://presskit.yearn.farm/

Made with love, by the Yearn creative team.