A bold, dynamic identity designed for the next generation.
Blatch 6 is a sixth form college offering specialist courses, contemporary facilities and an ambitious environment for young people taking their next step.
The college wanted an identity that could better reflect the quality of its offering, strengthen its reputation and appeal to a new generation of students.
We created a bold, flexible brand built around the most recognisable part of its name – the ‘6’ – transforming it into a dynamic visual identity that could represent the creativity, technology and business disciplines at the heart of the college.
Understanding what drives choice
Choosing a sixth form is a significant decision – for students and parents alike.
Before developing the identity, we explored the factors influencing that choice, looking at existing perceptions of the college alongside the priorities and expectations of its different audiences.
From this research, we developed audience personas that helped define the brief and gave us a clearer understanding of what the new brand needed to achieve.
The challenge was to create something that would immediately connect with a young, aspirational audience while giving parents confidence in the quality and ambition of the college.
Reinventing the ‘6’
The existing ‘6’ gave us a strong piece of brand equity to build from.
Rather than replace it, we reinvented it.
We developed the number into a distinctive pixel-based identity, breaking it into individual segments that could come together to create the complete mark.
Each element represents a different part of the college, while together they express the breadth of the Blatch 6 experience.
It gave us a simple but powerful idea: individual specialisms coming together as one.
Movement became an integral part of the visual language, with the individual elements of the ‘6’ able to shift, animate and transform.
The shapes within the identity gave us a much broader graphic toolkit.
Extracted, enlarged, cropped and rearranged, they create an almost endless range of compositions – allowing the brand to move effortlessly between bold advertising and more detailed communications.
Building a stronger presence
The new identity gave Blatch 6 a much more confident way to present itself.
Bold, energetic and designed around the interests of its audience, the brand reflects both the individuality of the college’s specialist disciplines and the strength of bringing them together under one name.
Most importantly, it helped reposition Blatch 6 and strengthen its reputation as a leading college in the area – creating an identity with the confidence and creativity to match its ambitions.
