Cambridge School
It's branding, omg!
Golden Anuaria Award 2020 Best Advertising Campaign
Platinum CLAP 2020 Award Best Campaign In Street
Platinum CLAP 2020 Award Best Brochure
Selección Agripina 2020 Award Best Street Marketing Campaign
Branding
Graphic Communication
Illustration
Sales Material
At long last, a new briefing is here. We had been doing the branding of the Cambridge School for 4 years, with a very specific aesthetic approach: flat design, drawings and somewhat childlike characters, colourful designs, highly descriptive slogans… Look: This all changed in 2019, and we were given new guidelines that allowed us to create a new visual universe and a new communication tone for this Language Academy which already has 9 schools in Catalonia.
Renewal of the discourse is essential for good branding. Brands, just like people, evolve over time.
First of all, the message — We were sent an initial moodboard about the visual style and the tone that Cambridge School wants for its new communication. They know exactly what they want. They are after an aesthetic and a language suited to a new target, now young people rather children. We started with the official slogan for the campaign. They wanted us to come up with something that gets young people and teenagers to really want to study and learn languages. Not an easy task! To tie in with the previous campaign, we recovered the idea of a slogan that combines languages, and to connect with the target we took a common expression from their vocabulary and appealed to their most basic desire: freedom. The slogan had to be descriptive, alluding to the services offered by Cambridge School, but also one that stimulated the target. And this is how “Parla Idiomes & Feel Free” (Speak Languages and Feel Free), a call to action that shows young people and teenagers the advantages of speaking different languages, saw the light. That by speaking languages they can do whatever they want. Or almost…
More message — The verbal message must be reinforced by the visual message. Both messages, in order to fit in properly and be effective, needed to use the target’s own language and vocabulary. For this purpose, we chose the visual universe of stickers of apps such as such as Snapchat or Instagram. We designed an exclusive collection of stickers to be applied to an oldish-looking graphic (black-and-white photographs and illustrations and etchings), and thus convey this message of freedom (and a rebellious, and even somewhat unruly, spirit). In this way, we created very descriptive, and even very clichéd and conventional designs, affording them humour, happiness and a decidedly young spirit. Another one of the advantages of this idea is that any graphic item that we might develop will inevitably be associated with the brand and its new visual identity merely through these four elements: a plain background, a white frame, a black-and-white image and a set of stickers arranged with a sense of humour. It adapts to any message that you might want to communicate and also to any medium or format. And it never loses its identity. It is always a brand.
A selfie — Competition in the sector is extensive and very stiff, hence the briefing also included (besides attracting the target’s attention) the need to stand out and be different. Our solution not only achieves this (the visual treatment is utterly unique and original), but also reinforces the brand’s values. Cambridge School’s educational system is as different and relaxed as its communication conveys. Well done!
