The Long Journey to Our Logo: One Destination to the Circle of Life
The story of our brand is a story made of two adventures that become one. It is a journey that starts from two different directions and then unifies into one journey, with one destination and one goal.
When Saruni and Basecamp joined forces and came together, the values were similar – conservation through tourism, tourism through communities – but the images chosen to express them were different. Saruni had a traditional logo, a tree and a warrior with a spear under it. The colour: burgundy red. Basecamp had a modern logo, with joined geometrical pieces. Colour: blue, yellow, orange.
In both cases the intentions of the message were similar: conservation is a puzzle composed of many pieces, one interconnected to the other. You cannot protect the African wildlife without protecting the land, you cannot protect the land without empowering the people who own it and use it.
So, how to create a common icon to use across all properties and geographical areas, that works for both our guests and the tourism and industry trade?
To answer this question, we first had to answer the bigger question of who we are, what we want to achieve and what are the values that make us unique.
The internal debate soon made it clear that what we are all passionate about is the circle of life. Or rather the circles: nature, wildlife, people, conservancies, Maasai, Samburu, culture, commerce, community. They overlap and link to each other.
We started to see that the S of Saruni and the B of Basecamp are at the same time different and the same, once they are seen as part of one design. It is the movement, the symbiotic connection, fundamentally the interdependence and kinship between people and nature.
The design of our logo, also, wanted to show that all we do is directed to Africa and the African territories where we are involved. The culture of the seminomadic communities who are our partners plays an important role in our gameplay, and this is why the logo carries their beaded symbols too.
Purpose
Custodians of the web of Life!
Vision
To create a healthy ecosystem where business, biodiversity and humanity live in harmony.
Mission
To protect the most important community-based wildlife ecosystems in East Africa, through community conservancies
Core Values
Passionate, Reliable & Fair
The movement of the S and of the B also connects with the wildlife eternal search for water and grass, in a circular and never-ending walk for life. The symbol between the words People and Nature is not simply the & of “and”: it is the symbol called “integral”, created by the mathematician Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz three and half centuries ago.
It symbolizes the interconnection, the concept that one cannot exist without the other. It is a talking point in itself that summarizes who we are with our guests and with our commercial partners.
So red and blue, S and B, beads and movement, nature and people, harmony and balance, Masai and Samburu.
As custodians of the cycle of life, we have the responsibility to protect its many components.
