Pyde Brand Reference

Version 0.1 · canonical brand guidance for the Pyde wordmark, glyph, and visual system.

This page is the source of truth for anyone (designers, contributors, integrators, ecosystem teams) using the Pyde name or mark. If you are about to make a logo lockup, a poster, a sticker, or a third-party landing page, read this first.

For the story behind the name and the mark, see How Pyde Works → What's in a name.

1. The name

Pyde — pronounced pied (rhymes with tide).

Do not:

• Write pYde, PyDe, pydE, or any other mixed-case treatment.
• Translate the name. It is Pyde in every language.
• Spell it out as an acronym (Programmable Yield Decentralized Engine and other backronyms). The name is not an acronym. Drop it from any third-party marketing that suggests it is.

Sentence patterns:

✓ Pyde is a sovereign L1.
✓ Send 100 PYDE to alice.pyde.
✓ pyde.network/docs
✗ The PYDE Network announces…
✗ pYde launches mainnet

2. The mark (glyph)

The mark is based on atomic structure — a nucleus and its orbital. Not a trend, not network imagery, not decorative. It looks like a physical law.

Anatomy:

• The vertical form is the core. Dense, gravitational, everything pulls toward it. Pyde is monolithic — consensus and execution in one place. Wide at the poles, compressed at the center: finality under pressure. Stress-tested and held.
• The circle to the right is in orbit. Independent, in motion, but bound to the core by an invisible force. External chains, bridges, light clients, portable finality certificates — they orbit. They are verified, not trusted.
• The two are separate on purpose. Related but sovereign. The composition is asymmetric — the orbital sits to the upper-right. Do not mirror, balance, or duplicate it. The core is fixed; the orbital can be anywhere.

Geometry:

• The orbital's diameter is about 0.40× the core's widest width.
• The orbital's centre sits about 0.55× the core's height from the top, offset right by about 0.85× the core's widest radius.

Guidance, not pixel rules. To recreate, eyeball against assets/logo.png.

3. Lockups

Clear space: the mark must always have clear space around it equal to 0.5× the mark's widest radius. No other graphic element (text, image, border) intrudes into this clear space.

Minimum size: the mark must not be rendered below 16×16 px. At sizes under 32×32 px, do not pair it with the wordmark.

4. Colour

The Pyde palette is black and white, with shades. Nothing more.

Restrained, calm, subtle — the visual posture matches the technical posture. The brand is meant to feel like a physical law: present, quiet, not asking for attention. Color noise doesn't belong here. The protocol is the product, not the palette.

These five grayscale tokens carry the entire brand. No accent palette. Color is not part of the brand.

Mark colouring rules:

• The mark is grayscale. The canonical rendering is the gradient version in assets/logo.png.
• A solid-black or solid-white version of the mark is acceptable for monochrome contexts (engraving, single-colour print, dark-on-light printing).
• Never recolor the mark. Not for theming, not for events, not for partnerships, not for special occasions.

Why grayscale only:

• The brand should feel like a physical law: present, calm, derived not designed.
• The mark is grayscale (a nucleus and its orbital, see §2). The palette mirrors that posture.
• A restrained palette stands out in a sea of colorful chains. Discipline reads as confidence.
• Color is reserved for one purpose only: the existing factory illustration (see §6), which predates this discipline and serves as a didactic diagram, not as brand surface.

5. Typography

Pyde uses system fonts. No custom typeface ships with the brand.

Why system fonts:

• Zero load time, perfect cross-platform rendering.
• Accessibility-first: respects the user's font-size preferences.
• No licensing complications for downstream community use.
• Consistent with Pyde's minimalism — the protocol is the product, not the typography.

When the brand needs a "voice" beyond system fonts (a presentation cover, a marketing illustration), use Inter (Bold or Black weight) for the wordmark only. Body type stays system.

6. The factory illustration system

The factory metaphor (see How Pyde Works) is a teaching illustration, not a brand surface. The animated SVG at src/assets/factory-loop.svg predates the grayscale-only discipline (§4) and retains its original color cues — droplets for transactions, an amber flash for wave commit, a green pillar for state, a gold lock for threshold encryption — as didactic shortcuts that help readers visualize Pyde mechanics at a glance.

These colors live in the animation only. They are not brand tokens. New illustrations default to the §4 grayscale palette; if differentiation beyond gray is needed, prefer pattern, opacity, line weight, or texture over color.

When making a new illustration:

• Use the §4 grayscale tokens.
• Lines are 1.4px for structural elements, 0.6px for fine detail.
• Corners are slightly rounded (rx="2" is the default).
• Animations loop on a 3-second cycle (matching the factory loop's tempo).

Diagrams that explain Pyde mechanics may reuse the factory's visual vocabulary in grayscale: droplets for transactions, boxes for vertices, pillars for state, smoke for eviction, a flash for wave commit.

7. Voice and tone

This is the brand's voice — apply it to any official copy or external comms.

Examples:

✓ Pyde commits in waves on a 128-validator Mysticeti DAG. Encrypted transactions stay sealed until the wave commits.
✓ v1 ships realistic numbers, not aspirational ones. ~10–30K plaintext TPS on commodity hardware.
✗ Pyde is the world's first post-quantum, MEV-resistant, infinitely scalable Web3 platform of the future.
✗ We are revolutionizing how the world thinks about blockchain.

8. Asset inventory

The canonical brand asset directory is pyde-book/src/assets/ (also mirrored at pyde-book/assets/).

Pending (post-launch designer handoff):

• logo.svg — vector source of the mark (currently only PNG exists).
• wordmark.svg — vector wordmark in Inter Bold.
• mark-monochrome.svg — single-colour version for engraving, single-colour print.
• social-card-default.png — Open Graph + Twitter Card default image.
• presentation-template.pptx / .key — slide deck template with the brand applied.

9. Third-party use

Community projects, ecosystem partners, and individuals are welcome to use the Pyde mark and name to refer to Pyde, subject to these rules:

Allowed without permission:

• Use the name "Pyde" to describe Pyde, in factual reference (news articles, tutorials, code documentation, third-party tooling that integrates with Pyde).
• Display the mark to indicate compatibility or integration ("works with Pyde," "deploys on Pyde").
• Reuse assets/logo.png and assets/factory-loop.svg at original aspect ratios.

Not allowed without permission:

• Use the name "Pyde" in your product name (PydeWallet, PydeDeFi) in a way that implies official endorsement.
• Modify the mark (recolour, distort, add elements, reshape).
• Use the mark on merchandise sold for profit at scale.
• Imply official affiliation with the Pyde Foundation when none exists.

For anything ambiguous, default to asking. There is no formal trademark registration at v1; the goodwill is community-held.

10. This document evolves

The brand is young. This document is a snapshot, not a contract. As Pyde matures and a dedicated designer joins, expect:

• A formal logo grid + construction guidance.
• A full type system (likely a custom display face for the wordmark).
• A motion-design spec beyond the factory loop.
• A photography / illustration direction for marketing.

When that work lands, this document gets revised and the version number bumps.

Document version: 0.1

License: See repository root