WAYCOMM Piano Brand Upgrade: A Crown Built from Piano Keys

A row of piano keys, a crown

In 2021, Xinming Design upgraded the WAYCOMM (威腾) piano brand for Zhejiang Pearl River Dehua Piano Co., Ltd. WAYCOMM's original logo was a black round badge with a crown formed from the letter W at its centre and a wreath of leaves on either side. Xinming Design kept the badge and the crown and upgraded it into a blue and gold round badge: the crown at the centre is now a row of piano keys of varying height, P·W (Pearl River · WAYCOMM) is kept beneath it, and the outer ring reads WAYCOMM and EST 2004. The brand colours are Elegant Blue and Wisdom Gold; six supporting graphics share the outline of the crown, each filled with music notes, piano keys, rhythm, the piano's inner structure, temperament or rolling forms. The project also delivered the applications. The new badge is still in use, in the header of the WAYCOMM website.

A badge that did not say "piano"

Zhejiang Pearl River Dehua Piano Co., Ltd. was founded in 2004 in Deqing, Zhejiang, as a joint venture between Guangzhou Pearl River Piano Group Co., Ltd. and Dehua Group Holding Co., Ltd., and mainly makes WAYCOMM pianos. Pearl River Piano Group holds 55% of the company; Pearl River Piano Group is listed on the Shenzhen Stock Exchange (002678), and its ultimate controller is the State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission of the Guangzhou Municipal Government. According to the WAYCOMM website, the soundboard, action and keyboard of WAYCOMM pianos are made by Pearl River Piano Group, and the cabinets by Dehua Group.

WAYCOMM's original badge used generic heraldic elements: a crown and a wreath of leaves. Although the crown was formed from a W, nothing in the badge related to the piano; from the logo alone, it was hard to tell this was a piano brand.

So the question for the upgrade was: how can an old badge say "piano"?

One zigzag line: W, pyramid and crown

The proposal's logo rationale page sets three photographs side by side, each overlaid with the same dotted zigzag line:

· The ribs of a church dome, labelled "CRAFTSMANSHIP": W stands for striving for perfection tirelessly, innovating within inheritance and rising through persistence;

· The outline of two pyramids, labelled "PYRAMID": a perfect sound source, excellent worldwide;

· The points of a crown, labelled "CROWN": the crown of manufacturing, distinguished.

The fourth layer is "CULTURE": create a perfect sound source and be an envoy of high culture.

The same rising and falling line is a W on the dome, pyramids in the desert, and the points of a crown. That zigzag line is the outline of the new crown: it keeps the old logo's idea that the W is the crown, and ties it to the solidity of the pyramids and the inheritance of craft.

Replacing the crown with piano keys

The new badge does not give up the crown; what changes is what the crown is made of. The crown at the centre is a row of upright piano keys: pointed at the top, tallest in the middle and lower at the sides, alternating wide and narrow, resting on a curved band. The construction drawing uses a as its unit and fixes the width and spacing of every key.

It is still the same crown, but now it is built from piano keys. A generic heraldic element has become a shape that belongs only to a piano brand.

The text on the ring and beneath the crown writes ownership and history into the badge:

· P·W: Pearl River · WAYCOMM, already in the old logo and kept, showing WAYCOMM's relationship with Pearl River Piano Group;

· EST 2004: the year the company was founded;

· WAYCOMM: the brand name, set along the top of the ring.

To suit the client's uses, the proposal provides several versions: one with EST and 2004 on either side and ZHEJIANG at the bottom, and one with EST·2004 at the bottom. The English wordmark WAYCOMM moves from a narrow bold type to a wider, steadier sans serif, and the Chinese 威腾钢琴 is respaced to match, forming horizontal and vertical lockups with the badge.

Six supporting graphics, one crown

All six supporting graphics take the three-peaked outline of the crown as their shape, each filled with a different language of the piano and paired with a photograph:

· Music notes: parallel diagonal lines, with a page of sheet music;

· Piano key: the pattern of black and white keys, with a close-up of a keyboard;

· The rhythm: rising and falling lines with nodes, like notes bouncing;

· Structure: crossing straight lines, with a photograph of a piano's iron frame and strings;

· Temperament: layers of concentric arcs, with a swirl of star trails;

· The rolling: a repeating triangle pattern, with a glass facade.

The outline stays the same while the content changes: on a shopping bag, a certificate or a poster, the crown outline says WAYCOMM, and the pattern inside tells which part of the piano it is.

Elegant Blue and Wisdom Gold

There are two brand colours. Elegant Blue (#0A2C61) is the main ground, paired in the proposal with a deep blue sea; Wisdom Gold (#D8BD85) is used for the badge, wordmark and supporting graphics, paired with the timber wall of a concert hall, and often appears as gold foil or metal on deep blue. Deep blue is steady and gold is warm, the same relationship as a piano's lacquer and its brass fittings. The proposal gives no PANTONE values.

The typefaces are Prompt for English and Source Han Sans CN for Chinese. The sample text on the typeface page is the brand line proposed by the client: "WAYCOMM, not just a piano, but my musical life".

From certificate to factory wall

The applications cover office, promotion, gifts and environment: letterhead, business cards, brochures, a product quality certificate, envelopes sealed with wax, a product catalogue and tablet presentation (model W188), paper cups, key rings, embossed letterhead, shopping bags, umbrellas, leaflets, posters, bus shelter ads and the factory wall sign. The gold wave lines on the shopping bag later appear in the banner on the WAYCOMM website's home page as well.

The office, promotion, gift, advertising and building images on this page are application mock-ups; names on the business cards and text in the brochures are placeholders.

Looking back five years on

Three points are worth taking from this project:

1. Upgrading a badge need not mean giving it up. WAYCOMM kept its badge, its crown and P·W; what changed was what the crown is made of: from a generic crown drawn from a letter to a row of piano keys.

2. One zigzag line can carry several meanings. W, pyramid and crown share the same rising and falling outline, so the meanings stack up while the shape stays single.

3. Write relationships into the mark. P·W and EST 2004 let one badge say what the brand makes, how long it has existed and whom it belongs to, linking WAYCOMM with Pearl River Piano Group.

Completed in 2021, the badge is still in use. A piano brand's crown is best built from piano keys.

How to verify

· Client: Zhejiang Pearl River Dehua Piano Co., Ltd., Deqing, Zhejiang (WAYCOMM website www.waycommpiano.com)

· Shareholding: 55% owned by Guangzhou Pearl River Piano Group Co., Ltd.; Pearl River Piano Group (SZSE: 002678) is ultimately controlled by the Guangzhou SASAC

· Status: the new badge appears in the header and home page banner of the WAYCOMM website (checked 31 October 2026)

· This case page: www.xinming.sg/en/portfolio/3128.html

Further reading

· Pearl River Piano Group: From Badge to P/R Monogram, Rebuilding the Identity of a 60-Year-Old Manufacturer (www.xinming.sg/en/portfolio/3014.html)

· Ritmüller: Making a 1795 Crest Readable Today (www.xinming.sg/en/portfolio/3035.html)

· Strauss: Writing a Piano and the Huangpu River into a Single Letter S (www.xinming.sg/en/portfolio/3039.html)

FAQ

Who designed the current WAYCOMM logo?

WAYCOMM's current badge was designed by Xinming Design in 2021 as an upgrade of the original badge, together with brand colours, typefaces, six supporting graphics and applications. The new badge is still in use.

What does the WAYCOMM logo mean?

A row of piano keys at the centre of the badge forms a crown, whose outline is also the letter W and the peaks of pyramids. The proposal sums it up in four layers: W for craftsmanship, the pyramid for a perfect sound source, the crown for the crown of manufacturing, and culture for being an envoy of high culture. The ring reads WAYCOMM and EST 2004, with P·W beneath the crown.

What does P·W mean?

P·W stands for Pearl River · WAYCOMM, showing WAYCOMM's relationship with Pearl River Piano Group. It was already in the old logo and was kept in the upgrade.

What did the upgrade change?

The old logo was a black badge with a crown formed from a W at its centre and a wreath of leaves. The new logo is a blue and gold badge with a crown built from piano keys, EST 2004 added to the ring, a wider English wordmark, and new brand colours and six supporting graphics.

What are the WAYCOMM brand colours?

Elegant Blue (#0A2C61) and Wisdom Gold (#D8BD85).

Which companies can learn from this case?

Manufacturing brands with an existing badge that want to upgrade rather than start again; subsidiary brands that need to show which group they belong to; and musical instrument and consumer brands that want to build identity from the product itself.

Xinming Design is a brand systems design firm. Its work centres on systematic judgment, turning brand strategy into structures that can run and be inherited. www.xinming.sg