Plants and purity: Cae Collective’s tidy identity for Pueyor expertly combines multiple languages

“Fitting both English and Chinese text in the layouts posed several challenges,” Cae Collective’s Creative Director Christophe Branchu tells us, discussing the design process behind the Shanghai-based studio’s brand and packaging design for vegan haircare brand, Pueyor. “Our main objective was to prevent the packaging from appearing cluttered or overloaded with text,” Branchu continues, looking to cut through the noise of China’s emerging plant-based haircare market, decisively selecting the specific English and Chinese information displayed.

“This involved several rounds of iteration to achieve a balanced layout that feels both informative and aesthetically pleasing,” he recalls, finding a similar balance in the brand’s type choices, having to find an appropriate typographic pairing between the two scripts. “Simplified Chinese font licenses can also be expensive,” Branchu explains, “so we had to be mindful when making our selection,” resulting in the use of a cohesive, pragmatic pair of sans and serifs – led by Heavyweight Type’s grotesque, Nuckle.

Guiding Pueyor’s typographic choices are the brand’s bespoke wordmark, the fluid forms of which not only capture the physicality of the company’s products but also a  luxurious lifestyle. “Our bespoke wordmark balances an incised and neohumanist style,” Branchu details, “resulting in a sophisticated typeface that conveys a natural aesthetic,” a feat achieved through Cae Collective’s refined typographic detailing, such as the wordmark’s inwardly-curved stems.

“The wordmark emphasises organic perceptions,” he adds, addressing the notion of ‘natural beauty’ within both Pueyor’s monogram – whereby the ‘P’ acronymises Pueyor, plant and purity – and the illustrative iconography across the identity, symbolising the organic aspects, processes and ingredients within its production. 

“Our colour choices were also inspired by the natural, organic ethos of the brand,” Branchu remarks, landing on a warm off-white as the primary brand colour, denoting the “sense of purity” at the core of its haircare products. “To represent the natural ingredients in each product,” he explains, “we complemented the main colour with a range of muted tones,” avoiding more contextually unrelated vivid hues. “In doing so, we created a harmonious colour palette,” Branchu concludes, “that conveys the brand’s values of purity, nature and authenticity.”

Cae Collective

Pueyor