Established in 2022, Aventia provides a comprehensive suite of environmental consulting services.  But when it came to consulting about recreating their logo, they came to Taro’s Origami Studio.

Having already seen some of Taro’s other origami logo projects (like Zenefits, Current, or ROI-DNA) Aventia requested an easily-foldable and fully-diagrammed version of their own bid.

Aventia’s logo was designed on the style of an origami bird.  But even though it is close to the classic origami dove, there are a few distinct differences that make it unique.  In fact, these changes made it a bit of a tricky model for beginners, and an even tricker model to design and diagram easily.

1. Feasibility Work

It’s one thing to re-create a logo in paper, but it’s another thing entirely to diagram it so that others can make it as well.  But the Taro’s team has a lot of experience in projects like this (the Berkeley Campanile comes to mind) and was up for a nice challenge.

To begin with the team started with the obvious problems.  First the head is tilted in a way that normal models won’t allow, and secondly there is the issue of making all of the color line up.  To start with the team folded several origami birds to get as close as possible and see what worked best.

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After tinkering around with the models it became clear that this project would be about balancing complexity and authenticity.  It was simple to design models that were close to the logo, but to make it a perfect match there were a lot of complex moves required.  And becuase the request was to also diagram the process so that beginners could follow along, the descision was made to try a model with 2 sheets of paper.

2. Diagramming

Frank Ling then began work on a model with 2 different sheets of paper that could interlock.  This would make each section easier to fold.  But after sending these versions off to the client for notes, they understandably found this a bit tricky as well.

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3. Refinement

It was at this point after a number of different attempts that Ben Friesen had a bit of a breakthrough.  The main issue of frustration was getting the head to align with the tail, but traditional origami simply wouldn’t allow it.

But this isn’t traditional origami, so how about a few unique tricks to solve the problem?  The solution was to make one simple cut in the paper, along the back of the bird where no one could see it.  This fixed 2 problems with one small change.  First- it allowed the model to be made out of one sheet, and secondly, it allowed the model to have the exact shape of the logo.

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With that small change, the Taro’s team was able to make 2 sheets for the client.  One of them was for the model, and the other was an instruction sheet carefully walking guests through the folding process.  The model even has a nifty fold-by-numbers system on the paper, so that you can always see which fold is next.  The client loved the result and this project is a great example of finding a unique solution that works for everyone.