Experimental Farm Network Brand Guidelines: The Open-Source Breeding Nonprofit

Experimental Farm Network is the Philadelphia nonprofit, from 2013, running participatory, open-source plant breeding for climate adaptation.

Experimental Farm Network brings the mission round its most collaborative cause — the Philadelphia nonprofit, from 2013, that runs participatory, open-source plant breeding and research through an online platform, aimed at climate adaptation and food security. The network keeps and shares the seed and the work, and its answer to a round about the mission is a shared breeding effort, open to anyone who joins. A brand, shared.

Its identity is the open-source breeding nonprofit. The nonprofit structure, the participatory breeding platform and the climate-and-justice mission are the story here. A brand, shared. The open-source breeding nonprofit.

(Honest notes, so the structure and the claims stay exact. Experimental Farm Network runs plant breeding and research as its heroes — collaborative, participatory breeding for climate adaptation and food security, coordinated through an open online platform — and we report its performance language as the organisation’s own. On what it is, the star point of this round, it is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit cooperative, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and it foregrounds a social, racial and economic-justice mission, which we represent factually rather than as generic marketing. It was founded in 2013 by Nathan Kleinman and Dusty Hinz. Two honest limits: we could not confirm an Open Source Seed Initiative pledge on the pages we reached, so we do not claim one; and while it practises organic and agroecological methods, a formal organic certification was not verified, so we do not assert it. Its designs are IP we describe but do not reproduce; there is no official brand hex; these tones are an unofficial interpretation.)

Experimental Farm Network lives in a network teal. Click a swatch to copy the hex.

The network’s identity is shared, nonprofit and participatory — a network teal, an ink, a pale sky, a deep sea, and a paper. The palette leans network teal and pale sky: a collaborative register that nods to a connected network rather than a loud logo colour. It signals an open-source breeding nonprofit. The honest caveat: with no published brand hex, these values are an original, unofficial interpretation, not first-party colours.

The lesson is a network teal signals a shared, participatory identity. The network’s world is a shared breeding platform. For designers, it is a reminder that a network teal and a soft pale sky can carry a mission brand — the tone of the connected effort. Because these tones can fail as small text, keep type dark and let the colour live in the accents, palette and band. The takeaways: frame it a 501(c)(3) nonprofit; keep the breeding participatory and open-source; do not claim an unconfirmed pledge or certification; and treat any single hex as unofficial.

The register is a participatory sans — shared, plain, collaborative.

The network’s identity carries a shared, plain, collaborative spirit — a nonprofit breeding effort, not a graphics label. A participatory sans captures the mood: clean, open and confident, the register of a shared platform. Set in a network-teal palette, the participatory sans feels shared and collaborative — exactly the personality the network carries. It is a shared effort rather than a logo, mirroring seed-packet paper. (The network’s real designs are things we describe but do not reproduce, and the exact typeface is not ours to use.) Because it is not ours to use, the honest description is “a participatory-sans nonprofit,” shown here in a stand-in. The type behaves like the brand: shared, plain and collaborative.

Experimental Farm Network stands for the open-source breeding nonprofit.

Experimental Farm Network brings the mission round its most collaborative cause. A network-teal palette, a participatory sans and a 2013 founding make one thing — the open-source breeding nonprofit — the whole identity: shared, nonprofit and participatory. The nonprofit structure is the pitch, and the open, participatory platform is the proof. The point is a breeding effort shared across many hands, in a round about the mission.

Put to work, the identity is the nonprofit told straight, structure named and unproven claims withheld. A steward in this spirit would frame it a 501(c)(3) nonprofit, keep the breeding participatory and open-source, and withhold an unconfirmed pledge or certification. A reader in this spirit would keep the facts right: Experimental Farm Network runs plant breeding and research as its heroes — participatory breeding for climate adaptation and food security, through an open online platform; it is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit cooperative in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, with a foregrounded justice mission; it was founded in 2013 by Nathan Kleinman and Dusty Hinz; it does not have a confirmed OSSI pledge, so none is claimed; and while it practises organic and agroecological methods, a formal organic certification is not asserted. The network sits among the round’s mission-driven organisations, its most collaborative. The honest editorial moves are to date it to 2013, to credit Kleinman and Hinz, to name the nonprofit structure, and to withhold the unconfirmed pledge and certification.

For designers and brand-builders, the network continues the mission: name the structure — and withhold the pledge you cannot confirm. The lessons: let a participatory, open-source mission carry a brand; frame a nonprofit as a nonprofit; represent a justice mission factually; refuse to claim an unconfirmed pledge or certification; and never reproduce a mark. It is also a reminder to stay precise: Experimental Farm Network is the Philadelphia nonprofit, from 2013, running participatory, open-source plant breeding for climate adaptation — with the palette here an unofficial interpretation. Read that way, the network is less a packet than a shared platform: nonprofit, participatory, open. The lesson for a brand is that a shared mission and honest restraint reinforce each other, and withholding an unproven claim keeps the story earned. Experimental Farm Network made the-open-source-breeding-nonprofit the identity — proof that a mission carries the round.

Keep Experimental Farm Network’s identity on hand — save it to a board in the Made Good inspiration library.