Case Study 03 - WSBPS Corporate Identity

Dupe Creative were approached by the Wirral Society of the Blind and Partially Sighted (WSBPS) in February 2009 to create a brand new corporate identity for the organisation.

The WSBPS is a group providing services for all visually impaired people of Wirral. Set up in 1989, the society realised the need for a professional, up-to-date identity that would reflect the incredible service they offer to an ever increasing number of people.

An initial brief was given by Lynne Sedgwick, the Development Manager at their base in Ashville Lodge, Birkenhead. The job was then left to us to create an identity worthy of a registered charity with 20 years of history.

Our first job was to look at existing charity logos. These were all organisations with huge resources and design budgets at their disposal, but we wanted the WSBPS to be able to stand alongside them on an equal footing.



Early ideas and testing in Adobe Illustrator stemmed from imagery sourced from the web. A lot of our research focussed on sight tests and the eye itself. If you've ever had an eye test you'll be familiar with a great number of very graphic symbols that most opticians use every day.



The final symbol chosen represents both the eye test image, a human iris and a sun flare. It is intended to highlight the direct link with vision that the WSBPS has as well as representing the energy, hope and optimism that the charity instills in all of its members.

The blue was chosen as we were reliably informed that this is a colour often used when working the visually impaired.

Two variations were given. One shows the full charity name whilst the other emphasises the abbreviated 'WSBPS' - something that they team want to push in the coming months and years (the full name is recognised as a bit of a mouthful!).



Designs for business cards and a letterhead were delivered to the charity on disk. Dupe Creative hope to have given the organisation a logo that will see them through the next 20 years. For information regarding the charity and it's work please take a bit of time to read through their website. Dupe hope to work closely with them on upcoming projects and, of course, will always be on hand to offer help and advice.



Thanks go out to Lynne Sedgwick, who we worked closely with throughout the entire project. The WSBPS turned out to be the perfect client. Best of luck to the WSBPS for the future.

For further examples of logo design by us, as well as our many other areas of creative expertise, visit our site.

Two New Websites from Dupe Creative

It's been a busy few months for the design division at Dupe Creative. Two new projects have reached completion in recent weeks - both of which happen to be websites.

First up is deeptek.co.uk.



Deep Tek is an innovative and experienced design and development company that has its roots in the specialist deep water salvage industry. With the help of freelance designer Nick Gerrard Dupe were asked to design and build a bespoke website to show off the many areas expertise Deep Tek offer.

Secondly, artist and sculptor Stephen Hitchin came to us asking for a refesh of his current site. Eagle eye viewers may notice the similarities between his site and ours. Well, give yourself a medal - the design is based on the Dupe template. It allowed us to very quickly build a new framework that is much more flexible in terms of maintenance.



Big changes for our site are afoot as well, however. We can't say anything yet but expect a big announcement before Christmas.

Crescendo.

Artwork designed by Dupe for the soon-to-be-massive band Crescendo.

New Work: Sean Orford Corporate ID

When Sean approached Dupe to create an identity for his psychotherapy/counselling business, we knew something different was required.

Sean has been working in both traditional and complementary healthcare for many years right across the UK. Currently based in North West England he supplies staff support services to local authorities, private companies and the NHS. On top of this, he is researching and developing training courses in an innovative approach to psychotherapy. Everybody got that?



The 'logo' is more of a symbol. After initial sketches and research into areas as diverse as Chinese Philosophy, the Eye of Providence and Pax Cultura we found ourselves rather stuck. The question of how to represent history, mysticism, growth, balance, love AND Sean seemed unanswerable.



Rather than focus too much, we switched our focus to selecting an appropriate typeface. Archer proved to be just the trick. Friendly, forthright, elegant and beautifully legible it cried out to be used.

From this momentous decision came the symbol itself. Formed from two reflected and intertwined 'S's it jumped off the screen. Thank you, Hoefler & Frere-Jones. (update: Jonathan Hoefler himself emailed me saying how much he liked the logo - how cool is that?).



After slight alterations the final logo was approved in its above form. The intertwined version is designed for large scale printing, whilst the simplified version is intended for website avatars, icons and for small print.

The symbol means many things. Its tree shaped body symbolises growth, the intertwining unity, its heart-shaped upper portion = love, whilst the capital S, of course, stands for Sean. Its simplicity should provide the right balance for Sean - a balance between his commercial and spiritual interests. It is a symbol intended to stand the test of time.

Letterheads (printed on the finest possible paper courtesy of Tapleys, Bebington) and envelopes will be followed by business cards and a complete website, also to be designed by Dupe Creative. Watch this space for updates.

What is Graphic Design?

"Wanky, trendy, crap." Amongst other things ...

Cast Study 01 - The Dupe Creative Logo

This is the first in what should become a series of studies into the design and photographic processes we go through at Dupe. What better place to start than with ourselves, we thought?

For those that don't know, Dupe Creative is a small but perfectly formed graphic design and commercial photography studio. Based in the North West of England it consists of its two founder members - Matt Goodfellow and Edward Lamb.

First, of course, we had to agree on a name. After scouting around we struck gold with 'Dupe'. Aside from it's slight negative connotations, we felt it would help set us aside from the many boringly named rival companies (you know the kind, the type that tend to over-use the word 'solutions' in their company skill-set) and, as soon as wrote it down (see below) I knew we were on to a winner. Nice shape.



After my initial sketch, I quickly threw myself into Illustrator to play with a few typefaces. However, it quickly became apparent that a custom job would be needed to realise the circular, balanced, distinctive look I had in my head.



Each of the four characters is based on a circle. Various sections were added or re-shaped using Illustrators fantastic tools until I was happy with the look of each individual character. Finally, I adjusted the space between each letter and, for balance, added the registration symbol at the top right.









Next, I picked an appropriate font. Something unique, but super-simple. I decided upon Interstate, designed by a clever man named named Tobias Frere-Jones, better known now for his amazing work at Hoefler & Frere-Jones.





The logo and the typeface has been the base for all of our corporate stationery so far (see letterheads, business cards and CD wallets) both online and offline, and will hopefully survive in its intial form for years to come.

Most people know the importance of having a consistent set of rules for a business. If you don't, and think that we can help, then get in touch for an informal discussion about how Dupe Creative can help.

Radiohead and Marketing

Love them or hate them, it's more than likely that you're aware of them.

The above video demonstrates pretty clearly how and why they are still such a dominant force where other bands who emerged during the mid-nineties have crashed and burned.

We at Dupe like to think that we understand technology. Spending an unhealthy amount of time on the internet is just a small part of our design process.

Business card design

Dupe offer tasteful graphic design to satisfy even the most demanding of visually astute customers. Visit our graphic design portfolio for more information.