Epitype and Fat Beehive work on Article 19 rebrand

The charity, which campaigns for free speech, longlisted Epitype and some 11 other groups before selecting four consultancies to compete in a credentials pitch to review its branding. Epitype won the project about three weeks ago.

Article 19 is named after the freedom of expression item in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Established in 1988, the organisation is seeking to reassess its brand strategy after expanding into South America and Africa in recent years.

’The brand needs to encapsulate that level of growth, but because the logo has been around since the 1980s and uses Roman numerals it does not resonate in places that have different numeric and linguistic systems,’ says Epitype creative director Martin Roach. Roach continues, ’Also, the blue they use is quite corporate, and yet the issue of free speech affects everybody – after all, if that article is not well implemented, then much of the rest of human rights falls down too.’

Article 19 has what Roach calls a ’dual personality’, its activities including law work and campaigning work. ’The campaigning side resonates a lot more with ordinary people,’ he says.

Martin Clark, a senior director at Article 19, says, ’Historically, we have been a very textbased organisation, but we are hoping to use visuals much better than we do at the moment.’ Epitype will spend two weeks researching the charity and create the brand strategy over the following two weeks.

Fat Beehive is laying the foundations for a new website while it awaits the results of Epitype’s review.