Mezo
—Designing trust into crypto
Challenge:
The blockchain venture studio, Thesis, unveiled Mezo, a Bitcoin layer-2 network, from stealth with a $21 million fundraising round. Mezo is a ‘permissionless Bitcoin economic layer’ that leverages a neutral smart contract infrastructure to offer a wide range of applications for users. It is designed to amplify the Bitcoin blockchain’s infrastructure and provide cheap and fast transactions by allowing users to access applications that use Bitcoin for everything, enabling a thriving circular economy.
Thesis approached us with a problem: despite being invented 15 years ago, Bitcoin’s global adoption remains volatile and using Bitcoin is complicated. How do we design a brand that stands for trust and simplicity for the wider public, particularly the less crypto-savvy Gen Xers?
The blockchain venture studio, Thesis, unveiled Mezo, a Bitcoin layer-2 network, from stealth with a $21 million fundraising round. Mezo is a ‘permissionless Bitcoin economic layer’ that leverages a neutral smart contract infrastructure to offer a wide range of applications for users. It is designed to amplify the Bitcoin blockchain’s infrastructure and provide cheap and fast transactions by allowing users to access applications that use Bitcoin for everything, enabling a thriving circular economy.
Thesis approached us with a problem: despite being invented 15 years ago, Bitcoin’s global adoption remains volatile and using Bitcoin is complicated. How do we design a brand that stands for trust and simplicity for the wider public, particularly the less crypto-savvy Gen Xers?
The Mezo logo lockup
Solution:
Our approach was based on 3 ways to design trust into brands: 1) use imagery and refrences that people feel comfortable with 2) create an adaptable branding system to create consistency across every touch point with the brand 3) enable as much authenticity possible, especially in the beginning.
The Mezo name is based on Mesopotamia, the cradle of human civilization. Drawing inspiration from this heritage, we blended it with modern circular economy concepts, while still embracing the crypto-punk aesthetic. This fusion forms the bedrock of Mezo’s brand system — intelligence, wit, and decentralization; fostering an open conversation with Mezo’s users.
Our approach was based on 3 ways to design trust into brands: 1) use imagery and refrences that people feel comfortable with 2) create an adaptable branding system to create consistency across every touch point with the brand 3) enable as much authenticity possible, especially in the beginning.
The Mezo name is based on Mesopotamia, the cradle of human civilization. Drawing inspiration from this heritage, we blended it with modern circular economy concepts, while still embracing the crypto-punk aesthetic. This fusion forms the bedrock of Mezo’s brand system — intelligence, wit, and decentralization; fostering an open conversation with Mezo’s users.
The Visual Identity System (VIS)
“Our goal with Mezo is to extend the Bitcoin network to bring 25% of the world’s economy on-chain — roughly in line with the size of the U.S. economy today”
Matt Luongo
CEO of Thesis and founder of Mezo
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