one of the electric angel designed window stickers advertising free broadband wifi on scarborough seafront.

from the archives… this is a report for bradford district council upon completion of a seven year regeneration project to revitalise several inner city areas of bradford. it was accompanied by a website, also produced by electric angel: www.newlandspartnership.co.uk

we started electric angel design within the newlands area and were grateful for a grant to help us buy software. the newlands funding was also instrumental in the genesis of artworks creative communities which whom we have a long standing and creatively rewarding relationship, so being invited to design the report and website seemed fitting. an event within the communities to celebrate the achievements of the project was used to launch the report and we were also commissioned to design exhibition stands and a rolling visual presentation.

one aspect of the brief for this job was getting the balance between professional and interesting design without it looking like it had costs a lot of money - that’s often the case in the public sector, it’s not about looking flash but looking presenting information in a readable interesting format and with integrity. so much thought was given to the colours used and the paper we printed onto. likewise, with the exhibition stands the intention was to produce something that would be of use for the various community groups and organisations afterwards - given the economic circumstances of the area it would have been insulting to have a showy event in which there was no benefit to the community. artworks planned the evening utilising local creative talent and the end result of both event and print got the balance just right.

although there’s no doubt that scarborough is developing a more continental culture, it’s not often we’re to be found drinking wine at 10am overlooking the sea. at least not on a work day in february. but this morning our excuse was the official unveiling of a map of south cliff gardens on the esplanade - a joint project between scarborough civic society and scarborough borough council. [given the chilly morning it was mulled wine].

this has been a genuine collaboration - the original map was drawn by architect richard flowitt of the civic society, james did the digital colouring and labels and i did some work on the layout and typography. the map was also printed in last month’s renaissance news and we’ve received some lovely comments from people about it. thanks all. it has been commissioned to celebrate 50 years of the gardens coming under the management of the council and coincides with the restoration of the 13 shelters dotted across the south cliff.

the south cliff gardens are one of the legacies of scarborough’s victorian heyday and sometimes tend to get forgotten or ignored by visitors and residents alike which is a shame because there few more pleasant activities than a stroll through the gardens looking out to sea and spotting squirrels and birds - i’ve even seen wild deer there. hopefully a few more people will now be tempted in as a result of the map. it’s situated opposite the crown spa hotel, printed copies can be obtained from the renaissance office: 01723 341346.

the lead-up to the ‘your town, your future’ event seemed a bit of a headlong rush, not least ‘cos i was on holiday the week before and there’s always a sense of gathering momentum as you make plans for being absent for a week, ideally plans that don’t involve having to touch a computer whilst on holiday (which i happily achieved). add to this pressing print deadlines and it makes a busy pre-holiday couple of weeks.

working to the brief for the publicity material, the emphasis was on the drama performance and marketplace when in fact there turned out to be lots more happening too - stuff we’d have dearly loved to promote if only we’d known about it. the turn out to the event was perceived to be a success with over 800 people attending but i bet we could have got a few more down had we had chance to promote the cultural entertainment on offer.

there were some grumblings that the drama performance wasn’t a local production - that strikes me as a very fair complaint when you consider the huge wealth of experience we have in the town in both playwrights and performers. fortunately there was some great local stuff happening on the beach thanks to create who had curated an afternoon of good things including music, poetry performance and some wonderful hit-and-run (at least that’s what i call it) performance from rounders - the stephen joseph youth theatre. we were looking for a good photo of the banners we designed and my favourite has to be this [top of page] of some strange alien creatures gathered in front of a banner on the harbourside.

above is a sand drawing taking form on the beach on the saturday, coordinated by beam [little known fact: scarborough was previously a holder of the world record for the world’s largest sand painting, it was eclipsed in june of this year] and below is james’s much acclaimed nighttime photo of the harbour, here being used as a backgdrop to the renaissance friends stand. all photos from the forthcoming issue of renaissance news.

as promised yesterday. brochure design here, leaflet and invite here. again, apologies for our photoshopped images rather than real photos - we don’t often get chance to photograph stands in use. above: 5 panel stand pop-up stand; below: roller stands for use as part of larger display or where a smaller presence is required. the stands are designed so the background image runs continuously when placed together.

branding, leaflet and banners for a university of bradford led project.

we design quite a lot of these things, but as they’re often delivered straight to who we’re doing the work for we rarely get them in the studio to take a photo, so please excuse the photoshoppery on this image. this is a banner stand as part of the new artworks identity.

[we’re thinking of registering the phrase photoshoppery]