The client
BlokHuis is a new Western Australian architecture practice founded by architect Jemma Vandongen and specialising in custom-designed projects using prefabrication principles.
With more than 15 years of architectural experience, including five years focused exclusively on prefabrication, Jemma had developed a deep understanding of how off-site construction can offer clients greater predictability, cost certainty and efficiency.
BlokHuis grew from her belief that prefab could play a much bigger role in delivering thoughtful, architect-designed buildings across Western Australia, especially for people who wanted all the benefits of modular construction with a home designed around how they actually live.
The brief
Prefab still carries plenty of baggage.
Especially in Western Australia, where for many people, the category is associated with mining dongas, standardised floorplans and buildings designed around what a factory can produce.
BlokHuis was created to shift that perception, serving pragmatic, design-aware clients who liked the predictability and efficiency of prefab but still wanted a home shaped around their lives, their site and really good architecture.
The business needed a visual identity to make that proposition feel clear, credible and compelling from day one.
The approach
We started with creative benchmarking, exploring five visual territories across architecture, design and the broader creative world to find a direction that could build trust without disappearing into the category.
Jemma was drawn to a refined retro direction inspired by Bauhaus, Functionalist and European design history, which gave us room to use structured grids, expressive typography and confident colour while keeping the work feeling aligned with the aesthetic of an architecture practice.
From there, we developed three identity concepts around one core idea: the architecture should lead. Whatever we created needed to act as a frame for the work itself, giving BlokHuis a distinctive visual language without competing with the buildings, materials and spaces at the heart of every project.
The selected Swiss rationalist direction used clarity, hierarchy and repetition to create a visual system that felt considered, functional and design-literate, reflecting BlokHuis’ own approach to prefab.
The creative
The final identity is led by a bold typographic wordmark, supported by flexible logo lockups, a split logotype and a monogram that can adapt across different formats and applications.
We introduced a bold orange and deep charcoal as the primary colour pairing, supported by a secondary palette of dusty blue, sage green, and pale grey. Together, the palette feels confident and contemporary while sitting comfortably alongside architectural photography, plans and material textures.
A modular graphic system built from a 3×3 grid added another layer of flexibility, creating shapes that could be used across layouts, image holders and graphic accents as the brand grew.
Photo credit: Samee Lapham
The result
With the identity complete and the website live, BlokHuis launched with a brand that felt every bit as considered as the practice behind it.
The final system gave Jemma a clear, distinctive way to present the business across her website, presentation material, business cards and future touchpoints, while giving her enough flexibility to confidently apply the brand herself as the practice grows.
Most importantly, it gave BlokHuis a visual identity that supports the bigger ambition: helping architect-led prefab feel more familiar, credible and desirable to a new generation of Western Australian clients.
How good.
‘I really love my logo, colours and branding and am really proud to show people what you developed for me, for my website, presentation material, and business cards.’
Jemma Vandongen, Founder and Principal Architect
We helped a new kind of architecture practice make prefab architecture feel every bit as considered as the homes it creates.
