Visual identity and graphic design in Brussels
A graphic design studio established in Brussels since 2005: brand identities, visual identity guidelines and editorial design for European associations, public institutions and growing companies.
More than 80 organisations — among them FEFCO, EPHA, AGE Platform Europe and hub.brussels — have entrusted Simpl. with creating or evolving their visual communication. Every project ends the same way: a coherent, documented identity your team applies on its own.
Thirty minutes is enough to review your current materials and establish whether your identity needs to be created, corrected or simply documented.
Why a graphic design studio in Brussels
Simpl. works from Brussels, in direct contact with the European association and institutional world — federations, public institutions, B2B companies.
That proximity is not a decorative argument: it shapes how the studio works — the same ground covered by our page for European associations: the identities it delivers are restrained, structured, defensible in front of a board — and distinctive enough not to disappear into the mass of institutional communication.
Four constraints this context imposes, which the studio treats as starting conditions.
Governance with several approval layers
An identity that does not survive the committee does not exist. Creative directions are presented on your real use cases, with approval milestones identified from the start.
Multilingual audiences
Your materials live in several languages, with text lengths that vary by a factor of two. Grids and typographic hierarchies are built to absorb that, not to be recomposed with every translation.
Institutional credibility
In this context, an identity that is too demonstrative undermines credibility as much as a dated one. The studio designs for that narrow line.
French and English
The studio works in both languages, in Brussels and remotely for organisations based in other European capitals. Guidelines and application guides are delivered in your team's working language.
What a complete visual identity covers.
A visual identity is not a logo. It is the system that makes your organisation recognisable on every medium: your website, your annual reports, your presentations, your social media, your internal documents.
When that system is incomplete, every new item becomes an improvisation — and improvisation shows. A complete identity has six components.
The logo and its variants
Formats, minimum sizes, monochrome versions, clear space: everything that lets the mark remain itself outside its original context.
The colour palette
With permitted uses and contrast ratios checked for accessibility, rather than a board of shades left open to interpretation.
Typography
Ranked by use: headings, body text, data. An explicit hierarchy is what lets someone else set a page without calling you.
Layout principles
Grids, margins, image treatment. This is the level at which an identity holds or falls apart, far more than in the drawing of the logo.
The identity guidelines
The document that fixes the application rules for the whole system, in web and print formats, on your organisation's real use cases.
The templates
Working templates that let your teams produce without drifting. This last point is what separates an identity that holds from one that degrades.
Guidelines nobody can apply are a dead document. That is why every project ends with templates built in the tools you actually use and a training session — not with the handover of a PDF.
Three services, one system.
Brand identity and guidelines
Creating a new identity or evolving an existing one. The work starts with a review of your current materials and your positioning, not with logo proposals. The guidelines cover web and print, with application rules documented for each real use case — reports, presentations, events, signage.
Editorial design, print and digital
Annual reports, institutional brochures, publications, event materials. Simpl. designs documents that are legible, hierarchised and consistent with your guidelines — and builds the templates so the next editions stay coherent without starting over. This is the studio's historic core.
Graphic systems and templates
Presentation templates, document models, layouts for your social media and newsletters. Every template is built in the tools you actually use — not in software your team will never open. The project closes when your team produces on its own.
Whatever the service, a project ends the same way: the identity guidelines in web and print formats, the source files for the logo and its variants, the templates agreed in scope, an application guide, and a recorded training session with your team.
From review to guidelines, in four stages.
Review of what exists
An inventory of your materials, an analysis of the inconsistencies, interviews with the people who produce your communication day to day. The review establishes what has to change and what deserves to be kept.
Brand platform
Clarifying positioning, audiences and messages before any design work. This is what guarantees the identity expresses something, rather than following a trend.
Design
Creative directions presented on your real use cases: your annual report, your home page, your standard presentation. Never on decorative mockups. The rounds of feedback are framed from the outset.
Guidelines, templates and training
Complete documentation, working templates, a training session with your team. The guidelines are delivered both as a readable document and as production files.
Nicolas Havenith — Founder of Simpl. — art direction
Nicolas runs the review, the creative direction and your team's training. Since 2005, Simpl. has designed the identities and editorial materials of European associations, public institutions and B2B SMEs from Brussels.
LinkedInThree projects, three scales.
FEFCO
The European federation of corrugated board manufacturers. Its materials span very different contexts — international events, technical manuals, internal documents, sector-specific graphic elements — and had to stay coherent as formats and messages evolved. Simpl. has supported its corporate identity and print production for over twenty years.
View the projectECCO — European Cancer Organisation
The only multidisciplinary organisation bringing together every stakeholder in European oncology, its congresses gather oncologists, scientists, nurses, patient representatives and public decision-makers. Simpl. designed the event materials, printed collateral and signage: a graphic system that holds from one event to the next, across very different audiences.
View the projecthub.brussels
The public agency supporting Brussels-based businesses structures its offering into specialised clusters, each with its own scope. Simpl. designed their websites with a visual identity aligned on hub.brussels: each cluster stays identifiable without leaving the parent system.
View the project
Before starting an identity project.
What is the difference between a logo, a visual identity and identity guidelines?
The logo is a mark. The visual identity is the complete system — logo, colours, typography, layout principles — that makes your organisation recognisable. The guidelines are the document that fixes the application rules for that system, so every item produced stays coherent, whoever creates it.
What is delivered at the end of a project?
The identity guidelines in web and print formats, the source files for the logo and its variants, the templates agreed in scope (presentations, documents, social media), an application guide, and a recorded training session with your team.
Does the whole identity have to be redone, or can the existing one be fixed?
The review determines that. Many projects do not need a new identity: what they lack is application rules, working templates, and a clear decision on what to keep. That is often faster and more durable than a full redesign.
How much does a visual identity cost for an organisation?
The price depends on scope: a full creation or an evolution, the number of media to adapt, the volume of templates. It is established in a first conversation and set out in a firm proposal. Publishing a range before seeing your materials would not help you — it would be wrong in one direction or the other.
For projects that combine identity and a website redesign, the scope is that of the Digital Clarity System.
How long does creating a visual identity take?
It depends on scope and on your team's availability for approvals, which is often the real factor. The schedule is fixed at the start, with approval milestones identified in the first week.
Do you work in French and English?
Yes. Most identities designed by Simpl. are deployed in both languages, sometimes more. Guidelines and application guides are delivered in your team's working language.
One conversation is enough to frame your project.
Thirty minutes to review your current materials, identify the inconsistencies and establish whether your identity needs to be created, corrected or simply documented.
No commitment: by the end of the call you know what needs doing — with us or without us.