“Since when did getting there get so… out of balance?

“What if there were a better way? One that didn’t take filling a tank or emptying a wallet? One that kept our bodies and minds healthier? Kept our communities wealthier. Our air cleaner, our lives richer?

“And what if the answer was as simple as… walking?”

That question introduces this branding film for Oregon’s premier walking advocacy organization, unveiling a new name (formerly Willamette Pedestrian Coalition) and a bold new vision we guided them in creating. Next, we designed the organization’s new branding and website, and then, to launch the new organization at its signature fundraising event, we also concepted, scripted, directed, shot and cut this film.

The following year, we helped Oregon Walks revisit that very event, proposing they rename it the Weston Awards after the famous 19th-century walker (and owner of an excellent mustache) Edward Weston. Then, we created new branding and promotional tools and helped focus and articulate an innovative theme: a “shoe-seum” that matched the well-worn footwear of dozens of notable people in the region with their stories of walking.

“We need to change what it means to walk in our towns and cities,” said then-Executive Director Stephanie Routh. “And that expanded mission, we realized, required a new name to drive it. And just think of what such a simple thing as walking to work or the store can get us if more people do it. The more people walk, the healthier our population becomes. The cost we all bear in treating epidemics – from traffic crashes to diabetes – gets lower. Our air gets cleaner, we make a real impact on climate change, and our nation gets less dependent on fossil fuels and all the expensive problems they create. And best of all, we achieve stronger, more vibrant communities because people are actually living in them as opposed to whizzing through them.”