Central Avenue

We were commissioned by Birmingham City Council and Standard 8 to create the identity and graphics for an exhibition celebrating Birmingham's infamous 1886 exhibition of Local Manufacturers and Natural History.

Central to the identity was a bespoke typeface that we created based on the original hand-painted signs from the show. The typeface that they used wasn’t a typical decorative Victorian face, it was a simple sans serif – much more industrial and much more relevant for a contemporary exhibition.

What was important was to not lose the essence of the original designs through digitising. We wanted to make sure that we managed to retain some of the awkwardness and personality that the man-made letter forms had. We also created a set of word logos to keep its Victorian roots evident.