As well as developing unique identities for their three galleries (Modern, Portrait & National) we also created a new identity for the central organisation of the National Galleries of Scotland. The challenge was to modernise the brand, enabling it to evolve into new media and online channels without alienating the established old school audience base. We retained and crafted the original type and introduced a new graphic device representing both saltire and picture frame. It has given the organisation a renewed sense of confidence and the ability to communicate with a consistent and dynamic tone of voice.

We’ve been working with the good folks at Celtic Connections since 2010. For this year’s festival, we felt it was time to explore a new direction for the campaign visuals.

The event has evolved a truly global focus in recent times and we decided to try and reflect this richness and diversity with a bold graphic pattern. Built from interlocking letter Cs, we added shapes and textures created by hand and combined them to produce a rootsy, folk-art homage that has an almost ethnic feel to it. This simple process gave us a rich, complex collage that was then applied in various ways to a host of mediums across screen and print around Scotland and London.

We cannot claim all the credit but like to think the campaign went some way to attracting more than 100,000 people who attended the hundreds of concerts at venues across Glasgow. For the first time, ticket sales topped topped £1.1million. Job well done!

Inksters asked O Street to design a christmas mailer to spread festive cheer, and introduce their new image to clients and peers. The result was their most successful and engaging mailer to date. With the starting point of the new brand positioning as a ‘Forward Thinking’ firm we came up with the format of a Christmas hat, incorporating the key ‘arrow’ shape. Recipients were invited to take a photo featuring the hat and submit it to win a prize.

Inksters created a tumble-log showcasing the results, which by all accounts were overwhelming—over 100 submissions along with hundreds of tweets and mentions across the web. When most cards were long-gone (hopefully recycled into pulp) and even that handy memory stick had probably been lost in the bottom of a briefcase, people were still writing to Inksters with requests for their Christmas hat. The only challenge now… how do you cap that?

The new identity for the gallery, although conventionally written out in monospaced lettering, has a unique quirk that aligns all the O’s in the name on a vertical axis. This reflects the balance of clarity and surprise; heritage and forward thinking, clearly evident in the gallery’s offering. Since deploying the new brand, the gallery has received exceptionally positive feedback, increasing customer awareness and improving the visitor experience.