The world is screwed. Big companies can really feel the weight on their shoulders to do something about it. Most are talking about their future emissions, but global window company, VELUX made an oath to remove both future and past emissions – to be lifetime carbon neutral by signing a 20-year contract with WWF to save trees in the rainforest and help biodiversity all around the world. They’re doing that to remove all the CO2 they have emitted since they were founded in 1941

To do that they need to change everything within the company, so they need everyone on board. But all they had was a strategy document and a legal contract from WWF. They wanted something more engaging that could serve as a centre piece, so a heavy 60 kg pinewood poster was made for the headquarters’ lobby.

At the heart of the VELUX business is the Model Company Objective. A set of values on which the company was founded. The objective urges them to always do better than most other companies – through the products they develop and through the way they do business. In short: Doing well while doing good. The idea was to create a physical piece to remind everyone working within VELUX about this fact. Something to spark energy, conversations and pride internally. Something that could communicate the daunting task at hand.

The Pinewood Poster is a different kind of poster put into this world to translate a strategy into something tangible and sensory. Complicated contract lingo was turned into illustrations to make it easier to talk about the task at hand when standing in front of the poster, which is placed in the VELUX headquarters’ lobby. It measures 200x90 cm and weighs 60 kg. To make it clear that "doing good" is in the very DNA of VELUX, the poster was made of the actual product. Window wood. This was put through a CNC machine that would carve the illustration into the wood. A process that took 70 hours. Afterwards it was hand painted and weathered with varnishes to make it look like an antique valuable relic. An altarpiece from nature to remind everyone at VELUX about their task every day for the next 21 years.

On launch day the poster turned out to be quite the magnet. Employees, management, politicians and members of the world press all gathered around it and used it as a storytelling tool and as a beautiful backdrop for pictures. And it was almost impossible to not touch it. Most did. And touching the smooth, carved surface only added to the sensory experience.