What’s in a logo?
On occasion, we receive comments or questions about our logo, so thought it worthwhile to provide our thoughts behind the design.
The inspiration for the logo centers around the star known in western culture as the North Star (also known as Polaris or Pole Star). Polaris is actually a triple star system (Polaris Aa, -Ab and -B) that we observe as part of the Ursa Minor constellation.
Polaris has been used historically as a (nearly) fixed point in the sky, around which the other stars are observed to rotate, as viewed from Earth. This obviously makes it a very useful navigation point as it constantly points towards the north (+/- 0.65 degrees, for the pedantic).
We took inspiration from long exposure photographs of Polaris in the northern night sky as inspiration for the logo.
The inspiration behind the company name is also driven from that concept – Northstar embodying guidance, direction and stability, which are concepts we strive to embody into our work.
Previous Northstar logos
When the business started in 2016, our logo was very different than it is today. Our original logo heavily featured icons depicting our core business sectors (left to right: agribusiness; resources and waste; property; transport; industry; and power…
We had a minor redesign in 2018 but retained those core design features…
Our current design has been used since 2022, which removed the business sector icons in favour of a simpler iconographic design. Our current logo also changed the name from “Northstar Air Quality” to more simply “Northstar“, which better reflects the broadening of our services. Of course we have retained our core service offering of air quality science and engineering, but now offer a broader range of sustainability, environmental consulting and environmental accounting services.
air quality | environment | sustainability
An acknowledgement:
… And by no means should you think that we came up with these designs by ourselves! The 2016, 2018 and 2022 logos were all designed with the inspiration and invaluable help of a renowned local graphic design artist, Elspeth Boyd.
- Source: https://science.howstuffworks.com/north-star.htm
- Source: https://science.nasa.gov/solar-system/what-is-the-north-star-and-how-do-you-find-it/