Brand & Design Direction · v2
Human-centered smart cities for a green planet.
01The Peg — A World Built From Teal Glass
This is the locked visual world. Every WSCC image is a physical object sculpted from teal glass, photographed in a studio — never a flat graphic, never a hologram. Bridges, cities, spheres, icons, even letterforms are rendered as thick frosted or polished glass, edge-lit so the light lives inside the material.
The signature object: the logo, made physical.
The halftone dot globe from the logomark is rebuilt as a sphere of individual glass discs, edge-lit in the teal gradient. It is the one object that appears across every campaign — hero of covers, watermark of slides, emblem of badges. When the sphere is present, the asset is unmistakably WSCC.
02Two Stages, One Material
The glass world performs on two stages. Same material, same teal, opposite grounds. Pick the stage per use case — never mix them in one frame.
CREAM STAGE — explain
Soft white studio world. Translucent glass objects on cream grounds, gentle shadows, high air. Use for infographics, program pages, sponsor decks, daytime social, print. Feels institutional, optimistic, Apple-clean.
INK STAGE — announce
Near-black scene, glass edge-lit from within, light rays and mist. Use for countdowns, speaker reveals, keynote covers, teasers, awards. Feels cinematic, prestigious, main-stage.
03Logo
Light — on dark grounds (primary)
Dark — on light grounds
The halftone dot globe is more than a mark — it is the brand's signature object and texture. In assets it is rendered as a sphere of 3D glass discs in the same halftone arrangement, edge-lit in the teal gradient (see reference 28 and 50 below — the mark made physical on both stages).
Sub-brand system — proposal / example only
A concept for how the branches could work, not a locked decision. Every branch keeps the same logo and swaps only the gradient, tone-matched to the teal (same deep and bright values, different hue). The mother brand stays teal; each branch owns one color. Names and color assignments are placeholders to react to.
04Color
Primary — the logo
The core identity. Carries every glass render, glow, and stage.
Ink
#161616
dark stage ground
Deep Teal
#016D60
gradient start
Gradient Teal
#13B6A6
gradient midpoint
Bright Mint
#26FFED
gradient end · glow
Cream
#FFF9F0
text on dark
Supporting — the electric set
Five supporting colors around the teal, matched by perceived brightness: lime and gold glow in Bright Mint's light register, while orange, pink, and violet share one vivid register — each pushed to the strongest color possible at that brightness. No ranking between them — each is chosen by context, one per asset. Every one has a deep and gradient step available, built the same way as the teal ramp.
Electric Orange
#FC5400
action · urgency · Congress
Hot Pink
#FF268F
special moments · Culture
Electric Violet
#842BFF
Innovation
Electric Lime
#81FF26
Green
Electric Gold
#FFFB00
Youth
Shared neutrals — one Ink, one Cream
Every family performs on the same stage: Ink #161616 and Cream #FFF9F0. This keeps the system honest — the theory lives in the tone-matched color steps, not the neutrals, so sharing them strengthens it rather than breaking it.
05The Material — How WSCC Glass Behaves
Edge-lit, lit from within
Light concentrates at rims, bevels, and cut edges. The glow comes out of the glass, not from behind it.
Thick, with real optics
Visible refraction, internal reflections, depth of field. The glass has weight — chunky slabs, never thin film.
Frosted core, polished shell
Objects mix frosted (milky, diffuse) and clear (crisp, reflective) glass. Icons glow soft mint through the frost.
Staged like product photos
Podiums, plinths, vitrines, soft studio falloff. Every object is presented like a flagship product launch.
06Typography
Two typefaces only. Montserrat for display — it matches the logotype's geometric letterforms. IBM Plex Sans for body — engineered for clarity at institutional scale. Below: the scale, then what the type can do next to the glass.
DisplayMontserrat 500 · 64px
Cities built around people.
HeadlineMontserrat 500 · 32px
One room. Every builder of the urban future.
EyebrowMontserrat 600 · 13px · tracked caps
World Smart Cities Congress
BodyIBM Plex Sans 300 · 17px
The World Smart Cities Congress brings governments, technology pioneers, investors, and builders into one room, working toward one goal: cities that are measurably smarter and genuinely better to live in.
CaptionIBM Plex Sans 400 · 12px · Slate
Photo: Smart District Pilot, Singapore · WSCC 2026
Demo — cover lockup
July 2026 · The Congress
The future of cities is human.
Text lives on the dark negative space, never over the object. Eyebrow, headline, body — one mint word max.
Demo — cream lockup
Programs & Tracks
Where policy meets technology.
Same lockup on the cream stage — Ink type, Deep Teal eyebrow and emphasis. Bright Mint stays on dark grounds only.
Demo — glass through type · ink
SMART
Demo — glass through type · cream
CITIES
Top: the same lockup on both stages — Cream + Bright Mint on ink, Ink + Deep Teal on cream. Bottom: display type filled with the glass world (image clipped inside the letters) — for section openers, countdown numerals, and campaign words. All effects are pure layout; the images stay untouched.
07The Unified Scene — One Design, Every Asset
Every WSCC asset is the same five-layer scene, recomposed per format. Only the stage (cream or ink) and the crop change.
LAYER 1
The stage
Cream #FFF9F0 studio ground, or Ink #161616 darkness with mist and soft teal bokeh. Nothing else.
LAYER 2
The glass object
One hero object sculpted from teal glass — the halftone sphere first, or a bridge, city block, icon, or letterform. The hero of every frame.
LAYER 3
Light streams
Teal light trails, rays, and dot streams moving through or out of the object — data made visible.
LAYER 4
One color only
Deep Teal #016D60 → Bright Mint #26FFED. Every glow, tint, and reflection. No purple, no blue, no orange.
LAYER 5
The human anchor
People small against the light — a silhouette, a family, delegates on podiums. Technology big, humans present. Optional but preferred.
08Visual Vocabulary — The Recurring Objects
Seven motifs cover every message the Congress needs to send. Reuse these; invent new ones only when none fits.
The Halftone Sphere
Brand · identity · everything
The logomark as physical glass object. Hero of covers, badges, stage screens, watermarks.
Glass Infrastructure
Building · progress · partnership
Bridges, cranes, and towers under construction in glass. For development stories, sponsorships, roadmaps.
The Journey Map
Programs · agendas · ecosystems
Winding light-road connecting miniature districts — schools, clinics, markets, parks. For agendas, tracks, city case studies.
Portals & Thresholds
Launches · countdowns · invitations
Keyholes, glowing doors, monumental gates opening onto the city. For registration pushes, reveals, "step inside" moments.
The Rim-Lit Human
Speakers · community · awards
People traced in mint light against ink. For speaker cards, delegate stories, awards. Faces stay in shadow until reveal.
Light Through the Real World
Impact · outcomes · daily life
Photo-real cities, highways, and fields with teal data-light woven in. For impact stats, sustainability, quality-of-life stories.
Glass Icon Tiles
Topics · tracks · UI
Concepts as small frosted-glass tiles and plug-in objects — AI, energy, mobility, governance. For track badges, infographics, web icons.
09Composition System (crops of the same world)
| Composition | Stage | Format | Use | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| A | Sphere right, negative space left for logo + headline | Ink | 16:9 | Deck covers, web heroes |
| B | Glass object centered on podium, headline below | Cream | 4:5 | Feed posts, topic cards |
| C | Sphere top, streams rising, dark lower third | Ink | 9:16 | Stories, reel covers |
| D | Object cropped in a corner, mostly stage | Either | 16:9 | Slide + web backgrounds |
| E | People walking toward the object, rim-lit | Ink | 4:5 | Community, quality-of-life |
| F | Journey map winding through the frame | Cream | 9:16 / 16:9 | Agendas, program explainers |
| G | Silhouette facing a portal or the sphere | Ink | 9:16 | Countdowns, announcements |
| H | Photo-real city with teal light woven in | Real world | 16:9 | Impact, stats, press |
| I | Giant glass numeral or letter behind real skyline | Real world | 4:5 / 3:4 | Countdowns, edition numbers |
Full ChatGPT prompts for each: work/asset-prompt-bank.md. Text always sits on clean negative space — Montserrat, Cream on ink or Ink on cream, one Bright Mint emphasis word max. Never over the object.
10Image-Gen Master Style Block
Paste this block into every generation, then add the composition line from the table above. Keeps all output inside the peg.
Premium 3D render, [SUBJECT] sculpted entirely from thick teal glass — frosted core with polished clear-glass shell, strong edge lighting, visible refraction and internal reflections, glowing from within.
Stage: [PORCELAIN] soft white studio scene #FFF9F0, gentle shadows, product-photography lighting · or · [INK] near-black scene #161616, mist, teal bokeh, cinematic light rays.
Color: strict duotone — deep teal #016D60 to bright mint #26FFED only. No purple, no blue, no orange, no rainbow dispersion.
Style: flagship product launch photography, octane render quality, shallow depth of field, high detail. No text, no logos, no UI inside the image.
Stage: [PORCELAIN] soft white studio scene #FFF9F0, gentle shadows, product-photography lighting · or · [INK] near-black scene #161616, mist, teal bokeh, cinematic light rays.
Color: strict duotone — deep teal #016D60 to bright mint #26FFED only. No purple, no blue, no orange, no rainbow dispersion.
Style: flagship product launch photography, octane render quality, shallow depth of field, high detail. No text, no logos, no UI inside the image.
Logos and copy are always composited afterward in Canva — never generated. Judge output against references 28, 33, 42, 46 before accepting.
11Web Direction — One Site, Two Themes
The same page structure works on both stages. Ink theme for the campaign phase (countdown, hype, registration), Cream theme for the institutional phase (program, sponsors, press). Identical layout, swapped stage — proof the system holds. Navigation floats transparent with background blur over the hero on both.
worldsmartcities.com — campaign
CongressSpeakersProgramAwardsRegister
July 2026 · The Congress
The future of cities is human.
Government leaders, technology teams, and builders meet for three days to share what actually works in their cities.
Register nowSee program
120+
Cities
300
Speakers
3 days
One stage
Inside the Congress
Keynotes
Talks from mayors and city builders.
Awards
The best city projects of the year.
Speakers
New speakers announced every week.
Day 1 — Opening
09:00Opening keynote — The Human CityMain stage
11:30Mayors' roundtable: what actually workedGovernance
14:00AI in public service — live case studiesAI & Data
17:00World Smart Cities Awards — night oneAwards
Speakers
Marcus Reyes
Mayor, Valencia
Lena Moreno
Head of Transport, Singapore
Amara Volkova
CTO, Lagos State
James Tan
Urban Planner, Manila
The Branches
WSC Congress
The flagship event. Three days of keynotes, awards, and working sessions with the cities doing the work.
Visit Congress
WSC Culture
Arts, festivals, and the creative life of cities.
Explore
WSC Innovation
Pilot projects, startups, and city tech showcases.
Explore
WSC Green Planet
Eco, climate, and sustainability programs.
Explore
WSC Youth Leaders
Student and youth programs across member cities.
Explore
The Venue
Marina Convention Centre
Three halls, one waterfront.
Keynote arena, exhibition floor, and delegation meeting rooms — a ten-minute train ride from the airport.
DatesJuly 21 to 23, 2026
Getting thereDirect metro line, station under the venue
Partners
CitygridUrbanoNovaportTerraluxMeridian
Join us this July.
Three days in one venue, with the people building smarter cities.
Register now
Congress
AboutVenueTicketsProgram
TracksSpeakersAwardsConnect
PressPartnersContact© 2026 World Smart Cities CongressPrivacy · Terms
Ink theme — campaign phase
Countdowns, speaker reveals, registration pushes. Mint CTAs, rim-lit imagery, dark cinematic energy.
worldsmartcities.com — institutional
CongressSpeakersProgramAwardsRegister
Programs & Tracks
Where policy meets technology.
Four tracks covering governance, mobility, energy, and AI, built with cities that have already done the work.
Explore tracksDownload brochure
4
Tracks
60
Sessions
40
Case studies
The Tracks
Energy
Grids, storage, and the clean transition.
Livability
Services that reach every district.
AI & Data
Practical intelligence for city systems.
Sample Sessions
T1Digital permits: from 40 days to 40 minutesGovernance
T2Transit that people choose over carsMobility
T3District energy — the retrofit playbookEnergy
T4Measuring what citizens actually feelAI & Data
Track Chairs
Daniel Park
Governance Track, Seoul
Marta Ferreira
Mobility Track, Lisbon
Hana Suzuki
Energy Track, Yokohama
Noor Al-Rashid
AI & Data Track, Dubai
The Branches
WSC Congress
The flagship event. Three days of keynotes, awards, and working sessions with the cities doing the work.
Visit Congress
WSC Culture
Arts, festivals, and the creative life of cities.
Explore
WSC Innovation
Pilot projects, startups, and city tech showcases.
Explore
WSC Green Planet
Eco, climate, and sustainability programs.
Explore
WSC Youth Leaders
Student and youth programs across member cities.
Explore
The Venue
Marina Convention Centre
Three halls, one waterfront.
Keynote arena, exhibition floor, and delegation meeting rooms — a ten-minute train ride from the airport.
DatesJuly 21 to 23, 2026
Getting thereDirect metro line, station under the venue
Partners
CitygridUrbanoNovaportTerraluxMeridian
Bring a delegation from your city.
Present a case study, meet other city teams, or partner with the Congress.
Contact the team
Congress
AboutVenueTicketsProgram
TracksSpeakersAwardsConnect
PressPartnersContact© 2026 World Smart Cities CongressPrivacy · Terms
Cream theme — institutional phase
Program, sponsors, press, post-event. Deep Teal CTAs, studio-light imagery, calm institutional clarity.
12Photography — Two Moods
Real photography lives in two moods. Daylight: colorful, living cities — trees against towers, parks, blue sky, people outside. Neon night: Tokyo energy — saturated neon color floating on deep night black, the photographic twin of the electric supporting set. Pick one mood per asset, never a gray in-between.
Daylight mood
Blue sky, greenery woven through architecture, real street life. Colorful and optimistic — this is the "cities better to live in" proof.
Neon night mood
Tokyo vibe: neon signs, wet streets, deep night black. The neon colors echo the electric supporting set, so night photography feels native to the brand.
The grade
Day: lifted brightness, saturation up. Night: blacks deepened, neon saturation pushed. One recipe per mood, applied in batch.
The reject list
Gray overcast, washed-out dusk, beige office-stock look, empty lifeless streets. If it feels dull, it is out — every photo is either alive in daylight or electric at night.
Graded set: assets/photography/ (wsc-photo-01 to 08) · raw originals and grading recipes in photography/raw2/ and graded2/. Photos from Pexels, free license.
13Reference Library (the peg set)
Signature object — the logo made physical
The halftone globe rendered in glass. This is the brand's proof: mark, texture, and material in one object.
28 · The halftone sphere, ink stage — hero render
50 · Globe emblem in a glass puck on cream circuit rings
58 · Orbiting glass globe on podium — summit / global reach
53 · Halftone-built mark over a planet horizon — technique for dot-built objects
Glass cities & infrastructure
Urban form as sculpted glass — construction, connection, growth. Cream stage carries the institutional story.
33 · Suspension bridge + cranes, warm cream — partnership in progress
29 · Bridge under construction, cool sky variant
46 · Bridge macro with light-stream deck — speed + connection
27 · Isometric city-hub network — one center serving many nodes
38 · Teal data-ribbon wrapping a city island — flow through the city
31 · Glass heritage gates + ink-wash mountains — culture rendered in the material
57 · Journey map — districts of daily life on a light road
32 · Data-block cluster on dark circuitry — compute / digital twin
People in the light
Humans small, present, and rim-lit. Technology is the stage; people are the point.
37 · Keyhole portal to the skyline — invitation / access
51 · Rim-lit portrait — speaker teasers before the reveal
34 · Delegates on glowing podiums — awards, leadership
39 · Tiny figure at a monumental gate of light — scale + aspiration
40 · Figure beneath monumental AI letterforms on a dark dial
36 · Family before glowing turbines — outcomes people can touch
Light through the real world
Photo-real environments with the teal system woven in. For impact, press, and stats — the only place photography replaces glass.
44 · Light lanes on a mountain highway — mobility corridor
49 · Sea bridge into the skyline, subtle teal traces
41 · Balance-scales light over city and forest — governance, sustainability
45 · Giant numeral behind real towers — countdown / edition number
Material studies & icon objects
How the glass itself behaves, and how small concepts become collectible objects.
42 · Frosted battery on plinth — energy as product shot
48 · AI / API glass tiles + plug — topics as icon objects
54 · Polished cube cluster — modular systems
55 · Disc macro — the edge-lit signature up close
43 · Stacked discs, dark — the halftone unit isolated
56 · Ribbons through a frame — integration, throughput
35 · A logomark as chunky glass on a light ledge — technique for badges
52 · Mark in a vitrine — technique for award / trophy renders
47 · Mark inside a light doorway — technique for reveal frames
14Rules
Six things every asset does, six things no asset ever does, and a quick check before anything ships.
Always
✓
One object, one stage
A single glass hero per frame, on cream or ink. The two stages never mix in one image.
✓
The sphere signs the work
The halftone sphere recurs across every campaign — cover hero, slide watermark, badge emblem.
✓
Strict teal duotone
Deep Teal #016D60 to Bright Mint #26FFED carries every glow, tint, and reflection.
✓
Humans small, in the light
Silhouettes, hands, families, delegates — present in the scene, never bigger than the idea.
✓
Text on negative space
Montserrat on the clean side of the frame. One emphasis word max — Mint on ink, Deep Teal on cream.
✓
Logos and copy in Canva
Generate the scene clean, composite the words after. Type stays sharp, brand stays exact.
Never
✕
Off-palette color in renders
Glass renders stay strictly teal — no purple, blue, or rainbow dispersion. Electric Orange and Hot Pink live in graphics and UI only.
✕
Sci-fi clichés
No wireframe buildings, holograms, or floating UI screens. The world is physical glass.
✕
Generated text or logos
AI-rendered words and marks always come out wrong. They only enter in Canva.
✕
Text over the object
Headlines never sit on the sphere, the glass, or the city. The object keeps its space.
✕
Thin, weightless glass
The material is thick, edge-lit, with real refraction. Flat glassy film reads cheap.
✕
A second motif
The halftone dots are the only texture. Extra patterns dilute the signature.