A little while ago we were asked by Charlotte Vincent to create an identity for a new project: The Table. The purpose of The Table is to bring together talented female performing artists to discuss, nurture, celebrate, document and assess their ideas together. Still in its infancy the intention is to set up a number of ‘events’ or ‘dinners’ and document them through a website which we designed. The identity for the project was created by us and a number of very talented student illustrators. With a brief that was simple and to the point students were asked to: Put something on the Table!  Or rather illustrate anything you like to sit on top of the Table ‘T’ logo. The responses were varied and amazing and they form the basis of the identity. The static illustrations were brought to life in animation by our very talented intern Joe Brooks. Illustrators from Sheffield Hallam, Leeds Met and Bristol UWE all got involved and made the project what it is today. So to you all – THANK YOU!!!

Illustrator: Chris Anderson

George Chislett

Kirsty McKinlay

Sami Noir

Tom Henderson

Jamie Jones

Some 55 years ago the Council of Industrial Design (later the Design Council) held an award in recognition of the best designed products of the year from 1957 to 1988 – anything from cutlery to chairs to street lights. Fast forward 55 years and the V&A asked a group of Sheffield based designers (us) to put together a book about these awards. They, along with the Design Council, held a collection of photographs featuring winning entries and wanted a publication to show them off in conjunction with their massive design retrospective: British Design 1948 – 2012. The content is split into two parts: a chronological list of winners from each year and information about each specific subject area – Furniture, textiles industrial design and so on. Our solution with this mixed bag of content was to design a two in one book: look through it from page 1 to 108 and you get a chronological list of the winners. Flick through it from back to front and you land on shorter pages telling you about the specific design types. Clever eh? You can try it for yourself by picking up a copy for the bargain price of £14.99 from the V&A shop.

We’re happy to have been picked out of 160 companies to create a new brand identity for Creative England, the organisation replacing the country’s nine screen agencies and representing film, digital and other facets of our sector (excitingly, their remit is still evolving). There seems to have been plenty of industry press coverage on this one, mostly relating to the budget for the work, but we’re itching to play our part in getting them noticed for all the right reasons. More soon…we kick off next week.

We’ve just produced a visual campaign to promote Threads one of Sheffield’s best weekly club nights – named after the iconic 80’s TV film. We couldn’t resist the opportunity to tap into the paranoia of the film and produce an iconic mile wide megaton bomb about to desecrate our fair city. Yes we’ve resigned to the inevitable, the end is nigh! now let’s dance before we die!

A while back we produced our second Christmas PR pack for Sainsbury’s. Last years pack and event was all about the victorian Christmas and was set against the backdrop of a replica Burlington Arcade built in the Sainsbury’s headquarters in Holborn. This year had more of an understated modern bistro feel about it and so the design reflected that idea. We commissioned the very talented Peter Horridge to create a calligraphic illustration for the cover of the pack. All produced in beautiful clear and gold foil to reflect the luxury and understated quality that was on offer. T’is the season afterall.

Along the pleasant streets of Witney in Oxfordshire stands a bar / restaurant and hotel. Formally known as The Malborough Hotel, it has recently undergone a complete refurb and, as part of that work, we were asked to get involved in the redesign of the identity.

Back in the late 1700′s the Malborough was known as The Blue Boar. We thought this was perfect, so have resurrected the name and given them their very own resident pet – Bosworth the Boar. Lovingly illustrated by John See, Bosworth isn’t your run-of-the-mill everyday kind of wild boar. He enjoys the finer things in life. Good food and drink and a nice place to stay. You’ll rarely see him wandering the corridors of the hotel (he likes to keep himself to himself) but there are signs all over the place that he’s there. He even has his own room (although it’s best you don’t go in and disturb him). We’re working with them on the roll out of this idea for the interiors so check back for more Bosworth related news.

Tramlines Sheffield’s Free Music Festival wins its first national award as best metropolitan festival in the UK beating The Camden Crawl amongst other strong competition. Obviously we played a huge part in the win with our brilliant branding and campaign lol…

This years 100% Design saw us collaborate with the Japans finest film & animation agency WOW. The ideas which were made into short sting animations realised by WOW were all metaphors for the design process using the head shape developed for the marketing campaign. Part projection and part microtile installation, the films were shown in the entrance to 100% at Earls Court.

Having designed the brand identity and marketing materials for Platillos over the last few years, we were recently approached to give everything a bit of a refresh. It felt like the right time to do so as the offer at Platillos had developed from it’s early inception. The idea, then, was this: Platillos has always been about sharing and loving great food so we’ve given everything a much more freeform and energetic feel with some brilliant illustrations by Lucie Sheridan (an old college friend of mine). Cocktails are represented without a single glass in sight, and the main meals are described by a horse with beautiful hair. More to follow in the future!

The team enjoying a coffee in the best cafe in the world! – Bragazzi’s.

Influence Agents provide social media monitoring to give businesses insight to online market intelligence, helping them reach there online audience and engage in conversation. Having already consulted on the BBC and BBC Radio on Social Media, The CLO (Chief Listening Officer) of Influence Agents commissioned us to re-position them as the authority on the subject. Our solution was to create a shield emblem reminiscent of a surveilance agency. The Lion symbolises the british origins of the company, whilst the headphones and emanating sound waves communicate the monitoring of online conversation.

Website design will follow shortly.

Click here to view the video on YouTube.