SomeOne unveils its ‘digital tapestry’ rebrand of Norwich City FC
Consulting everyone from the groundskeepers to former players, the studio created a new look and feel for the club that has community and local history at its core
London-based design agency SomeOne has revealed its recent brand overhaul for Norwich City FC (NCFC). Following its work on the club’s historic crest, reimagining it 50 years after it was created, the team at SomeOne set about updating the rest of the club’s visual identity.
The brief given to them by NCFC was to “develop a branding system that was not only visually impactful, but also had deeper meaning,” says Someone executive creative director Rich Rhodes. This was guided by a research process that involved the team reaching out to a diverse selection of groups and individuals associated with the club.
“Working side-by-side with a steering committee consisting of staff, board members, club legends and fans, we developed an identity that taps into and leverages our rich past and propels us (visually) into the future,” explains Rhodes.
Alongside the thoughts and wishes of NCFC’s players, fans and stakeholders, SomeOne also drew inspiration from the history of the local area. During the research process, they came across ‘The Strangers’ – a group that fled religious persecution in the Low Countries (consisting of Belgium, the Netherlands, and Luxembourg) and arrived in Norfolk in the 14th century, bringing with them the skill of weaving.
Focusing on this key piece of local history, they created a digital tapestry that showcases this traditional method of textile production in a modern context, with the tapestry able to scale smoothly from “graphics to real-time goal updates on your phone”.
This finding also inspired a bespoke typeface, which SomeOne created in collaboration with Colophon Foundry and which is presented in a range of “predetermined two-tone colourways”, providing future ease of use for NCFC’s in-house design teams and giving the club the option to apply the font to its back-of-shirt design.
“Some of the elements [of the branding] are quite traditional, like the crest, but the typography is deliberately more dynamic, allowing it to speak to a younger audience digitally,” says Rhodes.
He goes on: “We’re really happy with the final result and we think we’ve created a nice balance between historic and modern. It’s definitely not just a beauty parade – the idea of the weaving is inherently Norwich and Norfolk, so it’s something to be proud of.”
