Derbyshire’s Heartwood Community Forest
Bringing local landowners, farmers, businesses and communities together to plant trees, support rural communities and create a future forest for Derbyshire.
Key Deliverables
Brand strategy | Visual identity | Responsive website | Comprehensive brand guidelines | Marketing materials | Brochure + print collateral design | Bespoke illustrations | Social media design
Led by a passionate team, the Heartwood Community Forest project had already delivered a number of major projects and created real impact for Derbyshire when they first approached CRUSH. Yet the heart of Heartwood was waiting to be properly told. The people, the vision, the stories of real impact being achieved… all of it needed its own platform. We created a brand and website that amplifies their work and gives the team the platform they deserve.
We carefully designed and delivered a comprehensive brand workshop which brought the Heartwood team together to explore what makes the scheme genuinely unique. From these insights, we developed a detailed brand strategy rooted in people and place. This strategy captures the scheme’s unique identity, giving it permission to be playful and characterful whilst showcasing the serious work being done.
The visual identity brings this strategy to life through a distinctive system of bespoke illustrations. The illustrations animate as users scroll the website, creating a sense of growth and movement that mirrors the forest itself. Practically, the website needed to do important work: show landowners how straightforward it is to get involved, demonstrate the quality of support available and gently myth-bust the “too good to be true” perception that can surround community forest schemes.
A comprehensive brand guidelines document ensures the identity works consistently across social media, print, and the Forest Plan, whilst sitting comfortably within the Derbyshire County Council brand hierarchy.
From our client
“We needed a brand and website that did the practical work, making it easy for landowners to get involved and showcasing our team’s expertise, but we also wanted something that felt special and distinctive. CRUSH delivered both. It’s a brand we’re genuinely proud of, and one that will represent Heartwood brilliantly for years to come.”