Eurostar Group receives a rebrand from DesignStudio

Comprising a new logo, symbol, colour palette, photography, illustration and sonic branding, the new identity brings both companies together under the Eurostar name, which was chosen “due to its powerful equity and global recognition”.

The new branding will launch in full by the end of 2023, and hopes to put a modern face on the Eurostar Group while respecting the heritage of its two brands. “A key part of the success of our partnership was to work closely with Eurostar and Thalys stakeholders to capture the essence of each brand’s near 30-year heritage, whilst evolving them into the future,” says Julien Queyrane, DesignStudio creative director.

The ‘spark’ is intended to be used across the full brand experience – from train livery and across stations, to digital platforms including website, apps, social media and TVCs. The new identity also modernises the Eurostar and Thalys colours, featuring a punchy blue and deep navy, and six secondary colours.

Koto juices up the branding for checkout platform Bolt

Founded in 2014, checkout platform Bolt offers one-click payments for over 300 retailers. Perhaps unsurprisingly, in a time of ever-increasing convenience, the company has raised millions of dollars in investment, taking it to the level of a ‘decacorn’ – that’s a startup with a value of $10b+, for readers outside the world of venture capital.

The tech company brought Koto in to overhaul its visual identity and create something that could grab attention in a competitive landscape of “somewhat bland sans-serif wordmarks”, according to Koto creative director Arthur Foliard.

“There was a huge and unprecedented opportunity to stand out from the crowd and to bring more personality into a pretty expected space,” he tells CR. “There’s a reason behind it. Most of these brands want to look secure, but you don’t need to be bland to feel trustworthy. By prioritising feeling safe they all feel the same.”

Even the tail of the @ sign includes a spiky edge, thanks to a bespoke typeface by PangramPangram. In total, says Foliard, there’s 15 electrified glyphs, chosen as the characters users would see most often.

Raise your arches

Credits:
Agency: Leo Burnett
CCO: Chaka Sobhani
ECD: Mark Elwood
Creative Directors: James Millers, Andrew Long
Senior Creative: Gareth Butters
Art Director: Joe Miller
Creative Director of Design: David Allen
Designer: Jakk Breedon
Production Company: Moxie Pictures
Director: Edgar Wright

Thix hair loss brand

Hair loss is big business these days. Given that around 80% of men and 50% of women will experience it in their lives, it’s hardly surprising that the market for products and supplements is booming – to the tune of an estimated $23.6 million globally.

The brand’s visual identity is rooted in the fact that it is “backed by science, not magic”, according to Otherway, the studio behind the new branding. The process began with choosing the brand name itself, which is a combination of the words ‘thick’ and ‘fix’.

Thix’s all-caps wordmark is designed to be unapologetically simple, creating a trusted stamp of authority across what can be a confusing industry for the consumer to navigate.

The rest of the identity is inspired by retro health and beauty packaging from the 70s and 80s, featuring two bold typefaces and a single colour palette of fresh green, referencing the product range’s mint and eucalyptus scent.

Take away your takeaway

Takeaway packaging is the third largest source of littering in cities across the world, according to recent research by the University of Cádiz in Spain.

As Norway’s largest takeaway restaurant chain, McDonald’s is a substantial part of the problem in Norwegian cities – and it doesn’t help that its iconic golden arches make its packaging very noticeable. But in a new campaign led by Nord DDB, the fast food chain is taking ownership of this role.

Leading with the message ‘take away your take away’, the campaign is all about showcasing the ugly side of McDonald’s packaging and encouraging fast food lovers to help the brand reduce littering.

Photos of McDonald’s trash lying around in the streets of Oslo have been artfully captured by photographer Jói Kjartans for print, social media, OOH displays and McDonald’s trays in order to reach as many customers as possible.

Trash cans have been placed next to OOH displays so that the golden arches can be used as a trash-guide, and the campaign also includes a commercial shown on TV and online. As for the longer term, the brand has initiated several measures to create long-term solutions.

A playful visual identity for plant-based milk brand KiddiWinks

The 100% plant-based milk reimagines a childhood staple with a formula comprising oat, chickpeas and chicory root, providing eight grams of plant-based protein and more than six grams of fibre.

Ahead of KiddiWinks’ launch in the US (it will roll out to other markets in the coming months), the team brought in New York-based Young Jerks to develop its branding and London creative agency Wildish & Co to lead on its website design.

The agencies started by asking themselves, what would a plant-based milk brand for kids look like? “KiddiWinks is a really interesting brand as it hits the intersection of sustainability and health, both key decision drivers in purchase decisions – especially for parents,” says Wildish & Co managing director, Sam Fresco.

Young Jerks opted for an illustration-led visual identity, which is full of youthful personality but also stylish enough for grownups. At its heart is a “gloopy and milky” hand-drawn logotype, says senior art director Kelly Thorn. Supporting fonts include Caspar by Flavor Type and Visby Round by Connary Fagen as the body copy, chosen thanks to its “soft serve” feel, she adds.

Ragged Edge rebrands Gaia, a startup offering the world’s first IVF insurance

Offering the world’s first IVF insurance, Gaia was created after its founder, Nader AlSalim, had a firsthand experience of what is a complex and expensive procedure. He was inspired to find a way of helping other families access IVF without succumbing to the financial hurdles that often make it impossible or unsustainable in the long-term.

Ragged Edge’s refreshed branding for Gaia counters these depictions, instead offering an inclusive, welcoming picture of the modern family, as well as a more empathetic and realistic understanding of the IVF journey. Using simple yet effective collaging techniques, it shows the many experiences one can go through during this process, as well as the different kinds of people that choose to use IVF.

This diversity is further embraced through Gaia’s new wordmark, which features both an uppercase and lowercase ‘a’ to represent the fact that no two families are the same. Meanwhile, an inspiring yet grounded colour palette aims to capture the difficulties of going through an IVF journey without compromising the optimism needed along the way.

As a whole, Gaia’s new identity is empathetic yet realistic. Unlike other organisations within the fertility industry, it does not shy away from the fact that the success of IVF is never guaranteed, and the process itself may not be an easy one. But nor does it make the treatment feel out of reach. Instead, it presents IVF as something that everyone should have access to, no matter their financial situation or the makeup of their family.

New look for Wok to Walk

Wok to Walk began life in 2004 as a tiny restaurant in Amsterdam, inspired by the founders’ travels around Asia. Fast forward to today, and it’s a global food brand with over 100 sites in 20 countries.

Inspired by this ancient form of cooking, the new logo features a wok with a lightning bolt in the middle, which doubles as a signature W. Building on the dynamic mark, Without created a suite of patterns that sit across uniforms, takeaway bags and typographic posters.

A refreshed colour palette introduces new gradients inspired by the cinematography of Hong Kong director Wong Kar Wai. Meanwhile, a new photography style and art direction seek to translate the colours, flavours and emotion of Chinese street food, instead of falling back on tired clichés.

The brand’s renewed emphasis on copywriting also focuses on food quality, seasonal recipes and ingredients, rather than price or meal deals. In this vein, the chefs – who attend circus school as part of their training – have been renamed as Woksmiths to highlight their cooking credentials.

Jamie Oliver’s pasta brand

Otherway was enlisted to create the design identity for Pasta Dreams – a partnership between TV chef Jamie Oliver and Taster, a company comprised of food sub-brands which are all focused entirely on home delivery.

According to Otherway, the aim was to step away from what people might traditionally associate with Italian food, with an emphasis on retro design details.

The playful identity comes to life in a set of animations. Blobs of olive oil float through the air, and in the Pasta Dreams logotype, they rise up to form the counters in the letters A and R.

The psychedelic imagery carries through to the packaging, which highlights the “shapes, swirls, and splashes” people come across when cooking pasta and features a warm palette of peach, orange and brown.

The Pasta Dreams design concept seeks to appeal to younger customers rather than Oliver’s “traditional audience demographic”, yet there was an important balance to strike between unexpected and on-brand.

Ikea Norway promises to buy back unwanted furniture

Following the Trash Collection 2021, a campaign and initiative that spotlighted Ikea furniture which had been salvaged from the rubbish and re-sold at its second-hand stores, the Swedish retailer has announced the launch of the Life Collection 2022.

In a similar spirit to last year’s initiative, this one attempts to save and repurpose old furniture that is no longer needed. However, this time around, the furniture is not coming from the trash, but directly from people’s homes, with Ikea buying items back from owners.

As suggested by the title of the campaign, Ikea understands that buyers often don’t want to keep every piece of furniture forever and, given that life is a rollercoaster, these items can become unwanted due to a variety of reasons. In the short campaign film, directed by Kavar Singh and Niels Windfeldt, these reasons include death, sobriety, separation, childbirth, or simply because a significant other finds it “too tacky”.

The Life Collection 2022 marks another step towards sustainability for the brand, as it continues to address the widespread issue of waste. As one of the world’s biggest buyers of wood, it has faced criticism in the past for unsustainable logging practices, and as such, has worked hard in recent years to improve its credentials.

Credits: 
Agency: Try
Creatives: Caroline Riis, Eirik Sørensen
Designers: Jeppe Gjesti, Mats Mæland, Magnus Snickars, Dennis Magnus-Andresen, Tommy Lybekk, Marthe Solli, Elise Eik Ismar
Directors: Kavar Singh, Niels Windfeldt
DOP: Oskar Dalsbakken