Graphic

Designworks 181 Stuff

2022 Large Brand Identity
Credits
  • Pou Auaha / Creative Directors
    Jef Wong, Mike Pepper
  • Ngā Kaimahi / Team Members
    Oscar Thomas, Caitlin Rassie, Leah Surynt, Chloé Griveaud, Amanda Sommerville, Sam O'Flaherty, Jade Sullivan, Anzac Tasker, Tim Long, Dave Black, Alistair McCready (Typography), Tom Crampin (Animation & Sound)
  • Kaitautoko / Contributors
    Sinead Boucher, Phillipa Cameron, Candice Robertson, Andy Symons, Carmen Parahi, Joanna Norris, Fei Bian Goh, Kyle Morris, Sam Davenport, Sinead Bowie
  • Client
    Stuff
Judge's comments:

Bold, brave, fearless and progressive. A robust design system that challenges the status quo of the category.

Description:

Two years ago Stuff was bought back from its Australian owners. Since then, they’ve been on a journey to chart their own path and set their own rules. To reimagine what a media company can be. To follow no one.

Stuff needed a new positioning and identity to help illustrate and amplify this new direction – becoming more fearless, more imaginative and more human in every way.

Led by the idea of ‘follow no one’, and inspired by the creative drivers of Tūkaha (bold), Pōtiki (spirited), and Tiakitanga (for the People), we developed a new brand that carves its own path to a contemporary future, while cherishing the past. Putting the positive truths of traditional journalism at heart, while bringing them into a colourful, characterful and dynamic future – and always with purpose.

The identity system builds from the Stuff whakatauki – kia tūpeke te toa (let the brave leap). Setting a platform from which all Stuff’s ideas and stories can leap – heroing content, while adapting and flexing effortlessly across both print and digital worlds.

The mark represents openness and transparency, a pathway and how Stuff follows no one, the two sides of every story. Capturing a sense of where we are heading – Aotearoa and Stuff. The voice is characterful and non-conformist. Challenging the status quo and asking questions with a distinctively Stuff sparkle in the eye. Tackling the serious with heart and conviction, without ending up in earnestness like everyone else.

The new colour system is extensive, flexible and full of contrast, allowing for super expressive ways to tell stories and highlight content. The bespoke suite of typefaces, influenced by Joseph Churchward, a prolific Samoan-born typographer who crafted the original Dominion Post masthead, creates a distinctly Aotearoa voice.

The result is a brand that enables Stuff to be bolder and braver in what they do and how they share it – to follow no one.