Contributed by Alexander Andreyev of Ukraine-based Reynolds and Reyner.

Liverpool English Pub is the first classic English pub in Ukraine.

While working on the project it was very important to show the connection between the brand identity and traditional England. Especially with its famous city — Liverpool. That’s why we started with an analysis of the history and key elements of the town’s name and logo.

“The symbol of Liverpool is the Liver bird. This bird is like the legendary Phoenix and Sirin birds — there were no such a things in real life but scientists still argue what kind of extinct birds could be their prototypes. By itself, Liver is a symbol not only of Liverpool, it’s also a main part of the logo of the famous English football club. The second part of the city’s name relates to the water because the city is located near the sea.”
— ALEXANDER ANDREYEV

“After the analysis stage we found three main elements that needed to be combined in the logo: the Liver bird, location near the sea, and a heraldic style used in Britain during the birth of Liverpool. This has become the basis for the logo and the entire brand identity.”
— ARTYOM KULIK

The project was created in collaboration with marketing agency Pure.

These days, it seems like everything is about ‘the brand’, doesn’t it? In fact, there comes a point when famous people stop being, err, famous people and suddenly become ‘a brand’. And before you know it, a brand is due a rebrand! Whehey!

Companies rebrand for a variety of reasons: there’s been a change at the top and so they’ve got a new name; they’ve merged; they feel their current branding is tired and outdated; they want a new, more easily recognisable visual identity that will “set them apart”; their competitors have recently rebranded with a newly-designed logo and packaging that is going down a storm (Aargh!); or even, “Everyone’s rebranding, therefore so should we!” (Hmm).

Well, in recent years, companies like Saga, Little Chef, Burberry, Skoda, Lucozade, and even ‘newly health conscious’ McDonald’s all successfully rebranded (wasn’t introducing salads just genius?); however, among the numerous world-wide rebranding disasters have been: Gap, Tropicana, AOL, PricewaterhouseCoopers… And the less said about Royal Mail’s temporary rebrand to ‘Consignia’ the better, don’t you think?

Perhaps the key to gauging if a rebrand is a good idea is to first seek the opinion of those who matter most: consumers. What’s their favourite brand, and how attached are they to the current name, logo/sign, theme, flavour, ‘feel’…? Would a rebrand be more palatable (excuse the pun) if they were allowed to have a say in it all (the offer of choosing names from a shortlist always goes down well); and rather than a rebrand happening literally overnight, would the rebranding of a core brand (and/or its sub-brands) in a ‘baby steps’ help them to better get used to the idea over time?

Well, sounding out (and involving) your customers would be a smart initial move (the trick being to have your customers think that they created the rebrand… it was all their idea. Clever!), and it might just save you from one day being inducted into the Worst Rebranding Howlers of All Time Hall of Fame.

Finally, if you’re thinking of rebranding, and looking at costs etc., don’t forget that giving your website a make-over (of even a complete facelift) will mean that your signage and other printed material (letterheads, catalogues, brochures, business cards, etc.) may almost certainly also need to change, to ensure uniformity of design and style throughout.

The good news is that rebrand printing can be done affordably and quickly, and if your rebranding hits the bull’s-eye with your customers, then you’ll get your money back in no time. And then some!

We’re not saying don’t rebrand but unless you consult all of your stakeholders (customers, staff, suppliers, investors etc.) then you may face an unwanted backlash.  Having spent a small fortune on the exercise, the last thing you want to do is revert back to the previous branding.

Appointed as brand strategists and identity consultants following a four way pitch in April 2010, London branding practice SomeOne has created a comprehensive new brand identity for the National Maritime Museum group in Greenwich:

• The National Maritime Museum (the largest maritime museum in the world)
• The Royal Observatory (the Home of Greenwich Mean Time — GMT)
• Peter Harrison Planetarium (London’s only public planetarium)
• The Queen’s House (The birthplace of British architectural Classicism)

On July 12th 2011 the new Sammy Ofer wing of the National Maritime Museum opens its doors with an impressive new set of offers for visitors. The branding will be launched with a high-profile campaign supporting the opening of the new wing.

The new Wing and the rebranding come at a time of renewal and greatly increased profile for the Museum, for Greenwich and for the World Heritage Site as a whole. In 2012, Greenwich Park will host the equestrian events for the London Olympic and Paralympic Games. In addition, to tie in with Her Majesty The Queen’s Diamond Jubilee in 2012, Greenwich is to be given the rare honour of becoming a Royal Borough in recognition of Greenwich’s global significance as the home of the Prime Meridian, Greenwich Mean Time and a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

Kevin Fewster, Royal Museums Greenwich Director said, “This is the most important year for the National Maritime Museum since it opened in 1937. The new brand identity sets out to reflect these dynamic changes — that will run across all the four sites and programmes.”

As for the visual identity, David Law, co-founder of SomeOne explained, “Our inspiration was the idea that the achievements and discoveries made in Greenwich in navigation, time-keeping, astronomy and technology, resonated and echoed around the globe, like the ripples from a stone dropped into a millpond — the National Maritime Museum naturally has to be the splash.”

“We wanted to make as big a splash as possible for the Museum, so we decided to create a 21st century image rendered entirely in CGI which would give us the opportunity to animate and light it, creating a flexible brand world that could evolve and adapt over time.”
— KARL RANDALL, SENIOR DESIGNER, SOMEONE

“We created an entirely bespoke ‘splash’ that we then lit with different colours to make individual splashes for each of the three sites — sea blue for the Maritime Museum, gold for the Queen’s House and Royal purple for the Royal Observatory.

“The best part is that people see different things in the splash — some see a crown, others see a ship, there’s even a star constellation amongst the droplets. We decided that it would be more reflective of the diverse offer of the group to keep these elements subtle, so you see a splash first and foremost, then maybe something else at a second glance — like seeing shapes in clouds.”
— DAVID LAW, CO-FOUNDER, SOMEONE

“Alongside this, we have employed the beautiful typeface ‘Farnham’ by Christian Schwartz as a group typeface family for all communications. It is a contemporary take on 1700’s punchcutter Johannes Fleischmann’s work. Known for its ‘sparkle’ on the page, Farnham has been designed for the digital age and for us really reflects the new directions of the museum as a whole whilst acknowledging the past.”
— KARL RANDALL, SENIOR DESIGNER, SOMEONE

As the identity rolls out, the splash will ‘come alive’ as the ‘liquidity’ brand world is further employed across digital signage and gallery projections.

Claire Hyde, head of communications at the National Maritime Museum said, “SomeOne has produced an inspiring identity for us which reflects the huge steps we are taking to engage with our visitors in a contemporary, more conversational way.”

The brand world has been applied to all launch items from uniforms to tickets and merchandising and SomeOne is also retained as brand guardians as well as being tasked to create year one campaign advertising which will include exhibitions and installations by star designers, United Visual Artists and historian and curator David Starkey.

Key facts:

This was a two-year project to re-brand and re-name:

• The National Maritime Museum (the largest maritime museum in the world)
• The Royal Observatory (the Home of Greenwich Mean Time — GMT)
• Peter Harrison Planetarium (London’s only public planetarium)
• The Queen’s House (The birthplace of British architectural Classicism)

SomeOne — strategy, naming, branding and advertising
United Visual Artists — exhibition design
Clear — signage and wayfinding
Real Studios — gallery design
Plant — digital signage
BVA — digital and website

—

View more identity work on the SomeOne website. Follow SomeOne co-founders Simon Manchipp andDavid Law on Twitter.

Great Stuff!

29 WAYS TO STAY CREATIVE from TO-FU on Vimeo.

I thought the contents of the below article were incredibly insightful and truly relevant to the field of personal branding. It’s great to get other people’s insights into the same field.

The categories are summarised along the top as well as summed up with a photo down the left hand side. The scrolling picture gallery also showcases some very swanky roomsets that tempt visitors further into the website.

I love the purple colour scheme, its very different from the standard neutral colour schemes from other websites while giving a feel of quality.

<a href=”http://www.house2homemegastore.co.uk“>House2Home Megastore</a>

Social media — “friends,” “likes,” status updates, check-ins — forces us to live in a perpetual present tense with no long-term memory. Tweets that get pushed down too far into the past get lost; god knows what happens to Facebook status updates. But if these digital scintillae are ever going to become a real basis for forming emotional memories, we need to be able to “fix” them somehow. Enter “Social Memories,” a Facebook app that analyzes the glob of personal data you heedlessly throw into Zuckerberg’s maw and visualizes it as attractive infographics that you can have printed out as an actual keepsake book.

Before you scoff at the notion of capturing status updates for posterity, it’s hard to deny Social Memories’ keen eye for data visualization. Status updates and “Likes” are near-pointless individually, but in aggregate they really do form a pointillistic image of what you were really thinking, feeling and doing at any given point in your social-media-augmented life.I discovered my most active day on Facebook is a Wednesday and I’m least active on a Monday (can understand why really!) It displays information who is  like your most active friend in terms of ‘likes’ and ‘comments’, what is the most popular birth month of your friends and much more information that normally would not be interesting but presented in a way that really makes the information worth reading.

In aggregate, Facebook likes form a pointillistic image of you.

It’s the same thinking that led Nick Felton to create his beloved “Feltron Annual Reports” about how many stairs he climbed or lattes he drank over the course of a year. Like Felton’s work, Social Memories touts its “infographics that show your social highlights and trends,” “elegantly designed to present your memories with clarity.” Underneath the flip attitude, though, Social Memories is attempting something unique and necessary in the evolution of this medium: namely, allowing space for nostalgia.

Click here to try the Social Memories app.

South Africa’s kulula airline’s recent rebranding will leave every passenger with a basic knowledge of aviation and aircraft. Now every traveler can even learn where the black box is.

The 50

From speaking to friends, colleagues and recalling my own experiences I’ve complied The 50, a list of 50 things I believe every graphic design student should know on leaving college. Some of these points are obvious, others less so – but all are brief, digestible nuggets of wisdom that will hopefully go some way to making the transition from graduate to designer a little bit smoother.

Share the 50

The 50 has been crafted to be shared, spread and debated. Each point has been synthesised intojust 140 characters (complete with a #the50 hash-tag) making them memorable and Twitter friendly. Tweet your favourites, share them on Facebook, and send this URL to your friends –The 50 needs to be seen by as many students as possible – because feedback is crucial for the next step…

The 100

Ultimately I want to have 100 points in total. This list will no doubt throw up debate and I’m sure many will have questions and queries that have yet to be answered. So please email me, tweet me or leave comments and have your say on what the next 50 points should be, and together we’ll write The 100 – a condensed primer for students and graduates-to-be.

Thank you, I look forward to working with you

1. You are not the first.

There are very few ‘firsts’ these days. Countless others have started studios, freelanced and requested internships. It can be done. #the50

2. There is always someone better.

Regardless of how good you are, there will always be someone better. It’s surprisingly easy to waste time worrying about this. #the50

3. Success is not a finite resource.

College fosters a zero-sum mentality: that someone has to fail for you to succeed. In truth, another’s success doesn’t limit yours. #the50

4. You cannot score without a goal.

If you don’t know what you want, then how can you pursue it? Having a goal defines an end point, and subsequently, a place to start. #the50

5. Starting anything requires energy.

It takes more energy to start than it does to stop. This is true for physics, your career, and that idea you need to work on. #the50

6. The path to work is easier than you think.

To get into the industry you need just three things: great work, energy and a nice personality. Many forget the last attribute. #the50

7. Have a positive self-image.

Your self-perception is your most important asset. See yourself as the person you want to be and others will see this too. #the50

8. Get a clean, simple website up.

An online portfolio is the alpha and omega of your career. With a wealth of web services, there’s no excuse for not having a website. #the50

9. Curate your work.

Never stop editing your portfolio. Three strong pieces are better than ten weak ones – nobody looks for quantity, just quality. #the50

10. Listen to your instincts.

If your work doesn’t excite you, then it won’t excite anyone else. It’s hard to fake passion for mediocre work – scrap it. #the50

11. Make your work easy to see.

People are lazy. If you want them to look at your work, make it easy. Most of the time employers simply want to see a JPG or PDF. #the50

12. Hand-write addresses.

Clients, prospective employers and potential clients gravitate to letters with handwritten addresses. The personal touch goes far. #the50

13. Time is precious – get to the point.

Avoid profuse humour or gimmicks when contacting studios for work, they’ve seen it all before. Get to the point, they’ll be thankful. #the50

14. Never take an unpaid internship.

This is not necessary evil – a studio that doesn’t pay their interns (at least the minimum wage) is studio not worth working for. #the50

15. Do as many internships as you can stand.

Internships are a financial burden, but they are vital. They let you scope out the industry and find the roles that suit you best. #the50

16. Don’t waste your internship.

A studio’s work can dip, as can its energy. Ignore this and be indispensable, the onus is on you to find something that needs doing. #the50

17. Make friends with a printer.

A good relationship with a printer is invaluable – they will help you save money and the environment. #the50

18. Find your local D.I.Y. store and pound shop.

These places are invaluable resources of cheap and ready-made artifacts ripe for tinkering, re-decoration and re-contextualisation. #the50

19. Be patient.

It’s not unusual to complete several internships and not find ‘a good fit’. Try applying to a studio you hadn’t considered. #the50

20. Ask questions.

Assume nothing. Ask questions, even if you think you know the answers. You’ll be surprised at how little you know. #the50

21. Ask for opportunities.

It will feel cheeky, but ask for things. Ask to be included in exhibitions, magazines, pitches – if you don’t ask, you can’t get. #the50

22. Seek criticism, not praise.

You learn nothing by being told how great you are. Even if you think your work’s perfect – seek criticism, you can always ignore it. #the50

23. Make friends, not enemies.

The creative industry is a small world: it’s a network where everyone knows everyone else. Remember this before pissing someone off. #the50

24. News travels fast.

A good intern will find their reputation precede them. Jobs are nearly always offered on this word-of-mouth evidence. #the50

25. Don’t get drunk at professional events.

There’s a difference between being ‘merry’ and ‘paralytic’. The latter costs you your dignity, your reputation and possibly your job. #the50

26. Network.

There’s some truth in ‘it’s not what you know, it’s who you know’. Talk to people, send emails; at the very least sign up to Twitter. #the50

27. Dress smart – look business like.

Take your work seriously? Then take your appearance seriously. Clients are more likely to deal with people who look like they care. #the50

28. Never work for free.

Not only does this devalue the profession, but it makes you look weak. Even a ‘nice’ client will take advantage of this. #the50

29. Negotiate.

If you really have to work for nothing, negotiate. Clients and studios have access many resources that can be viewed as ‘payment’. #the50

30. Read contracts.

Never sign a contract before reading it. Subsequently, don’t begin any job without a contact – you may have to write one yourself. #the50

31. Make your invoice stand out.

Businesses are deluged in invoices. Make yours stand out with colour or shape and it’s likely to rise to the top of the ‘pay’ pile. #the50

32. There’s no such thing as a bad job.

Always push yourself to do your best. Logically, there’s no way you can be dissatisfied with ‘having done your best’. #the50

33. There’s no such thing as a bad client.

The onus is on you to make the client relationship work, not the other way around. If it’s not working out, ‘fire’ them as a favour. #the50

34. Embrace limitations.

Limitations are invaluable for creating successful work: they give you something to push against. From this tension comes brilliance. #the50

35. The environment is not a limitation.

The environmental impact of your work isn’t a fashionable consideration – as a creative, it’s your most important consideration. #the50

36. Boring problems lead to boring solutions.

Always interrogate your brief – re-define the question. No two briefs should be the same; a unique problem leads to a unique solution. #the50

37. New ideas are always ‘stupid’.

New ideas are conceived with no context and no measures of success – this falsely makes them feel silly, awkward or even impossible. #the50

38. Do not underestimate self-initiated work.

Clients get in touch because of self-initiated work. Ironically, business is excited by ideas untouched by the concerns of business. #the50

39. Justify your decisions.

Clients fear arbitrary decisions – they want problem solving. Have a reason for everything, even if this is ‘post-rationalised’. #the50

40. Show sketches, not polished ideas.

Clients often mistake ‘rough’ digital work for the final design. Show sketches for as long as you can, it makes them feel involved. #the50

41. Work with the client, not against them.

You may think you’re right, but look at the client’s solution along with yours. Occasionally you’ll be surprised. #the50

42. Don’t always take no for an answer.

Fight for superior solutions. Demonstrate your thinking to your client, take them through it – it’s hard to argue with logic. #the50

43. Pick your battles.

The creative industry is often infuriating, but not every argument is an argument that needs to be had. This takes time to learn. #the50

44. If you’re going to fail, fail well.

Being ambitious means you have to take on things you think you can’t do. Failures are unfortunate, but they are sometimes necessary. #the50

45. Be an auteur.

Regardless of who you’re working with, speak up if something’s not right. Take it upon yourself to be the barometer of quality. #the50

46. Take responsibility for failure.

If a job’s going wrong take responsibility. It feels counter-intuitive, but responsibility means you can do something about it. #the50

47. Share your ideas.

You’ve nothing to gain from holding on to your ideas; they may feel precious, but the more you share, the more new ideas you’ll have. #the50

48. Get out of the studio.

Good design is crafted from understanding the relationships between things. These connections can’t be found when locked in a studio. #the50

49. Awards are nice, but not vital.

Awards look good on the shelf, but clients seldom pick up the phone because of them. Solid work encourages that. #the50

50. Don’t take yourself too seriously.

Take your work seriously, take the business of your craft seriously, but don’t take yourself seriously. People who do are laughed at. #the50

Business reporter, BBC News

Those little green pigs don’t know what is about to hit them.

Without any warning the birds rain in from above, destroying everything in their paths. But these aren’t just any birds – they are Angry Birds.

The Angry Birds game (where affronted fowls fight pigs who have stolen their eggs) is one of the most successful mobile applications – or apps – in the world.

It has been downloaded over 100m times and is one piece of a global industry expected to be worth over $30bn by 2015.

Ebay claims 15m people worldwide have downloaded its iPhone app in 190 countries and in eight different languages.

Globally an item is bought through Ebay’s app every two seconds.

Customer insight

An app is a piece of software that is downloaded onto a mobile device – be it a phone or tablet – which can then integrate with the gadget’s features such as its camera or GPS system.

It can be updated to bring you any of the latest products, offers or features that the creator wants you to see.

Apps provide instant access, without having to type information into a search engine and can usually be accessed offline (although not updated).

Paul Berney is managing director, EMEA, at the Mobile Marketing Association, a global trade body which promotes the use of mobile devices to develop brands.

He believes apps can offer unrivalled insight into customers’ behaviour.

“An app can tell you who you are dealing with, where they are and what they are doing, and then it can let you respond to consumers’ need,” he says. “No other channel can do that all at once.”

“For example it’s perfectly possible for me to walk outside now and start an app to look for a restaurant,” he says. “It will identify me, where I am, what kind of food I like that’s within 500m and any offers that are on.”

Professional services firm PricewaterhouseCoopers has launched a number of apps to serve its global clientele.

“As a professional services organisation we are trying to engage with people and give them insight,” says Jass Sarai, PwC UK Technology Leader.

“For example, recently when the UK’s budget was announced we delivered thought and views in real time on what it meant for global markets.”

“Ultimately we think clients will want to do more business with us because they value the insight we are giving on a real time basis,” he says.

Such has been the success of PwC’s apps, it recently launched one costing 23 euros ($33, £20), which offers analysis of the global entertainment and media industries, and marks the firm’s first foray into paid apps.

Stringent tests

ABI Research claims almost 8bn apps were downloaded in 2010 – clearly a sign of their popularity.

But it is also betrays a marketplace where your app could disappear quicker than a green pig under attack from an angry bird.

They are expensive to create – a simple app could cost you £20,000 ($32,639; 22,835 euros) and take two months to create.

A complex app could have a price tag of more than £100,000 ($163,200; 114,180 euros) and take six months to develop (and you’ve got to hope nothing happens to render it obsolete in that time).

This price multiplies if you decide you want to make it available on more than one operating system.

For example, an app that will work on an iPhone won’t work on a phone with the Android system, and vice-versa.

It has then got to pass stringent tests laid down by some companies, including Apple, before they will sell it – or even give it away for free – in their app stores.

Once your beleaguered app is on the shelf it is competing with about half a million others.

The process starts again every time either the operating system is updated or you want to update the software yourself.

“The first thing we say to clients who want an app is ‘are you sure?’” Colin McCaffrey – 2ergo

“The first thing we say to clients who say they want an app is ‘are you sure?’” says Colin McCaffrey, from mobile technology firm 2ergo, which has designed apps for companies such as insurance giant Aviva and the Australian Broadcasting Corporation.

“If you’re a brand, looking for a more involved brand experience, then often an app is the preferred choice, as this will allow you to engage customers in a more rich and interactive way,” he says.

He says one example is retailers whose customers use their app as a loyalty card by having their phone scanned when they make a purchase.

“But, for example, if you’re a retailer looking to open up a new sales channel via mobile then it’s important for you to reach as wide an audience as possible.”

“[In that case] rather than develop several apps at significant cost we would often advise brands to choose a mobile optimised web site,” he says.

Feedback ‘daunting’

As apps have only really been around for the last three years, you’ve got to learn quickly when problems arise.

Telecom price comparison website, Top10.com, discovered this when it launched an app allowing users to test the 3G connection speed on their phone.

“As soon as you release an app into the wild it’s difficult to control the functionality of it,” says Top10.com co-founder Harry Jones.

“The app crashed and some people said the readings were wrong. We also had huge amount of feedback from users, which can be pretty daunting,” he says.

“Businesses don’t necessarily think of it like launching a new store or office but apps will bring a lot more customers and a lot more information – it’s not just a bolt on.”

Top10.com recently released version 1.5 of the app, which Mr Jones says has fixed almost everything, and he remains sure creating an app was the right thing to do.

“It has allowed us to engage with new customers and introduce people to our brand and we have reaffirmed our position as an innovative company,” he says. “It’s a beacon of where we have to go.”

The future

The one thing you can be sure of is technology develops very quickly, which begs the question: will apps remain a feature of business for any meaningful time?

“We are seeing huge advancements in mobile websites and many app features you pay so dearly for, like animation, are becoming available on the mobile web”, says Mr McCaffrey.

“It’s difficult to say apps are a flash in the pan when Apple has had billions of downloads in three years.”

“Apple is pushing apps hard but at the same time Google is very much pushing the mobile web – and I wouldn’t bet against either Apple or Google,” he says.

What seems clear is attracting and engaging customers through mobile devices in some form is going to become increasingly important.

“Every enterprise will need [a mobile offering] as a central part of their infrastructure – deployment of mobiles and tablets are outstripping desktops,” says Jim Hemmer, CEO of international mobile technology designer Antenna.

“It’s connected 24/7, it offers immediacy and access to data in a form and substance that you need it.”

“People have a great affinity to their phone or tablet – if you can get your brand in there it can drive great results, far more effective than other forms of branding,” he says.

“It’s there when they go to sleep and it’s there when they wake up.”

So now it’s just up to you to decide how you go to bed with your customers.