In 1985, a third of the UK population tuned in to watch the Snooker World Championship, marking a peak in popularity for the sport. Since then, its following has steadily declined, with many now viewing snooker as a somewhat antiquated pastime.

But at the heart of the sport is still a loyal audience, and each year these dedicated fans watch the World Snooker Tour (WST) as 128 of the world’s best snooker players compete in international tournaments. In recent years, the WST has become the sport’s unofficial home and, as such, a bastion of its culture.

Keen to grow snooker’s global fanbase, the WST team reached out to London-based design agency Monday Nights to create a new brand for the tour. In doing so, WST hopes to welcome a new generation of supporters, as well as revitalise the sport’s dated image.

“World Snooker Tour approached us with one task: authentically define and design ‘snooker culture’ for the modern world,” says Matthew Caldwell, co-founder of Monday Nights. “Throughout our careers we’ve rebranded sports clubs, but never entire sports.” It was at once an exciting opportunity and a huge responsibility.

Following an intensive period of research, which saw the Monday Nights team play the game, run workshops, survey fans, and interview professional players, an identity was developed that both nods to the traditional imagery of snooker and pushes it into the present day.

At the core of the new identity is the logo, which takes inspiration from the iconic snooker triangle. While the Monday Nights team initially worried it was too on-the-nose, they ultimately realised that it would be impossible to ignore one of the sport’s most recognisable symbols. This motif recurs throughout the identity as graphic framing devices, which are brought to life in motion.

Elsewhere, the team introduced a display typeface based on the proportions of a snooker table, including corner details that resemble the pockets. Balancing the use of ‘pockets’ with legibility was no mean feat, but following weeks of development, they landed on a design that is accessible, distinctive and aligned with the sport’s heritage.

The colour palette for the identity was another tricky task, with Monday Nights closely studying the “distinctive tonality” of snooker balls to create a bold palette that could serve a more practical purpose of separating the series events.

“The tournament structure is still an area of contention but we believe we’ve now laid the foundations for WST to be able to make the calendar more understandable and more diverse in its global appeal,” says Caldwell.

As part of the overhaul, the design team worked with sports technology company Urban Zoo to build a website that leaves behind outdated associations of the sport.

The digital design revolves around a ‘light mode’ to avoid any associations with dark snooker halls, and features a live match centre and 40 different shot icons that deliver a “unique live snooker match language”.

“We’ve been so lucky that WST have believed in our bravest ideas, from reimagining the players uniforms, to using motion to create atmosphere,” says Caldwell. “Our design work has been treated with the utmost importance by the whole team – even the TV announcer Rob Walker knew who we were and liked what we were doing.”

mondaynights.co