JTK Studio revitalises Charney Companies’ look, emphasising simplicity, strength and a unique voice

JTK Studio, under the creative direction of New York-based designer Justin Thomas Kay, undertook the task to revolutionise the brand identity of Charney Companies. Known for their prowess in American real estate development, brokerage and management, Charney Companies needed a fresh image that captured both their creative essence and their robust leadership under Sam Charney. From the initial strategy and brand architecture to the final visualisation and implementation, JTK Studio orchestrated a comprehensive rebrand for Charney Companies. Their efforts culminated in a refreshed identity that communicates the firm’s vibrant creativity and solid, confident leadership.

“We needed a holistic approach to the identity that could telegraph strength and expertise but also be a direct reflection of a more creative spirit than what you would typically expect from a real estate company,” Kay reveals, who crafted the strategy in collaboration with Dudley Versaci. This is encapsulated in the new tagline ‘Let’s Build Something Beautiful,’ emphasising Charney’s commitment to creating equitable and beautiful spaces in the built environment. Building upon this, the visual identity was devised following extensive research and conversations about Sam Charney’s unique approach. 

The brand identity is anchored in a typographically driven system, using Nick Sherman’s HEX Franklin typeface as the primary typeface. “I’ve been waiting for the right opportunity to use Nick Sherman’s beautiful work on HEX Franklin for some time,” Kay notes. The typeface resonated with the deliberate, intentional way Charney approaches real estate development. “When Morris Fuller Benton developed Franklin Gothic for the American Type Founders, it was a distinctly American take on the other late 19th and early 20th-century gothics coming out of Europe. In the ’60s/70s, it was heavily used in advertising and editorial as a headline face, and I tend to ascribe that era with a specific kind of typesetting and editorial/advertising approach that is directly tied to NYC,” he elaborates. Interestingly, the system uses no supporting typefaces, relying solely on HEX Franklin to create a variety of visual expressions. “The fact that one might think that there are other typefaces involved in the branding speaks to the breadth of the type family. That is part of the reason I found it so applicable to this project and everything I needed to execute to bring the system to life after we launched,” Kay explains.

The underline between the wordmark and the single ‘C’ was a strategic decision to allow for modularity and focus, creating “a strong foundation for the identity that can allow for the secondary tiers of Development, Brokerage, and Management to bolt onto it,” says Kay. “And on its own, it has a way of asking for your attention with the underline. It solves a variety of problems in a simple and straightforward way.”

The brand’s colour palette is kept intentionally simple, with black, white, and an accent of soft red. This was a deliberate choice to help the brand stand out, as Kay explains, “The infrared tone gives us a distinct and categorically unique way to emphasise things with colour outside of photography when we need it,” Kay concludes.