Hamburg Sustainability Conference 2024

The Hamburg Sustainability Conference (HSC) is an international gathering to promote the 17 Sustainable Development Goals of the United Nations. Bringing together leading representatives from across politics, business and science, it took place for the first time in October 2024 with over 1,600 participants from 100 countries. The inaugural conference resulted in 15 concrete agreements, including the Global Battery Alliance and the Declaration on Sustainable Aviation. The next HSC is planned for June 2025.

Dörte Matzke and Julia Friese from the agency Matzke und Friese were responsible for the visual identity, along with the communication designer Ruth Heinlein. Their tasks ranged from logo development to corporate (website, printed materials) and event design.

For the logo, they used the symbol of a bridge, which was designed from the 17 colors of the UN Sustainable Development Goals according to the official SDG Color Wheel. Dörte Matzke commented on the design: “A bridge overcomes barriers and connects politics, business, science and civil society across the global North and South, and helps find solutions for a sustainable future.”

With Pangea, they found a suitable typeface for a conference on sustainability. Pangea is characterized by clear lines, excellent legibility and charming details and is suitable for both digital and printed applications. Its name refers to the primeval continent and symbolizes cohesion and global responsibility – a guiding principle that is also reflected in Pangea’s own sustainability.

A quarter of Christoph Koeberlin’s designer royalties from the sale of Pangea goes directly to climate protection projects, in particular to saving and reforesting the rainforest. In addition, Pangea was deliberately developed for multilingual communication, with extensions such as Pangea Afrikan for African languages and later additions for Arabic and Hebrew for the Arabic and Hebrew language areas.