Our new brand

As part of our 150th anniversary we have been working on reaching new people and celebrating our essential New Zealand culture, to build profile, increase the diversity of our organisation, and refresh ourselves for the next 150 years.

It is a genuine refresh of the organisation, not simply a new look. The changes in branding have involved a significant amount of research, both by surveys and focus groups and workshops which built on a similar level of work on our strategy for the future. Key elements include working very hard to become more diverse, open, and relevant.

More about New Zealand

The visual representation for this reflects people’s desire for us to reflect a more ‘New Zealand’ image, to be more approachable, more consistent and unified. In the past we have had many different logos for the work we do – now we have a consistent logo common to everything, but clearly noting different programmes/parts of our work. We hope it will be easier for people to see when our many activities are managed or supported by the Royal Society of New Zealand.

Our name 

That brings us to the next issue: our full name is currently Royal Society of New Zealand Te Apārangi.  The Council has agreed to use a shortened version that highlights our Māori name – hence you will now see more of the ‘Royal Society Te Apārangi’. Te Apārangi means 'group of experts' and this name was proposed to us by Professor James Wharehuia Milroy in 2007. The use of Māori should differentiate us from other Royal Societies and again reflects our New Zealand culture. Our legal name remains the Royal Society of New Zealand.  

Our koru

The logo has changed from a square box to a koru. This is seen as a recognisably New Zealand image but also, conceptually it depicts new growth while spiralling back to respect the past. 

Our tagline

We also have started using a short descriptor line (tag line) that lifts us up out of distinct disciplines into the overall pursuit of knowledge, and covers everything that we do. A lot of work, discussion and workshops were held to reach this point, and we have tested it on a wide range of stakeholders with a lot of support. Our role is to support New Zealanders to explore, discover and share knowledge, and hence our tagline is now “explore, discover, share”. 

The aurora on our homepage

Thank you to Dr Ian Griffin, Otago Museum Director, for sharing one of his excellent aurora photos from Hoopers Inlet, Dunedin, for our homepage.

We hope you enjoy exploring, discovering and sharing with us.