Venture Xtreme drops in with branding by Lavahouse

Billed as the UK’s first extreme sport destination venue, Venture Xtreme has launched its brand identity, with the help of North West design group Lavahouse.

Venture Xtreme aims to be a world-class sporting and entertainment destination, with plans to build six centres around the UK, including ones in London and Yorkshire.

Lavahouse has worked on branding for VX for almost six months, since winning the business at the end of last year. Steve Jones, managing director and mastermind of Venture Xtreme, says that he handed Lavahouse the project on the strength of its ‘passion and motivation’ for VX and asked it to create a logo, brand guidelines and a series of promotional brochures for ‘investors’.

‘Our brief was to come up with a cutting-edge identity that would help take Venture Xtreme to a global market,’ says Steve Scott, partner and creative director of Lavahouse.

He explains that his group came up with the idea to break down the VX brand into four further sub-brands, each representing a different category of sport. ‘It’s easier for the investors to see what sport fits in where,’ he adds. Lavahouse will work on consumer branding, once commercial elements have been put in place.

The first VX centre to be built will form part of the £270m Yes! development project in Rotherham, Yorkshire, and is expected to feature world-class facilities, including a 9290m2 climbing wall, what it claims will be the world’s longest artificial cave, a rope adventure course with three vertical levels and an Olympic-standard slalom and rafting course, when it opens in 2010.

Approval for a site in London has been granted and is expected to be built at the £2bn Silvertown Quays development in the capital’s Docklands area.

Jones explains that the concept has been taken on and is being backed by regeneration consultancy David Taylor Partnerships. According to Jones, who project manages the building and development of the centres, VX ‘ticks every box of regeneration’, in that it will be a main attraction for visitors to the wider developments at Rotherham and Silvertown.

‘As a major sporting attraction, Venture Xtreme will deliver the people, with the commercial elements of the development spanning out around it,’ he explains. ‘There will be endless opportunities for design consultancies as the developments move on. It will really revive the regions.’

It is hoped the brand will attract partners to occupy the retail, hospitality and leisure infrastructure of the Rotherham and Silvertown sites.

The Yes! development at Rotherham, which aims to regenerate a 121ha brownfield site, will incorporate more than 92 000m2 of facilities, including a hotel and an exhibition centre.

Jones says that two hotel groups and four retailers are interested in partnering with VX at the Rotherham site.

THE FOUR SPORTING ZONES
• Water – rafting, scuba diving, canoeing, surfing
• Wheel – mountain biking, skating, BMX sports
• Vertical – skydiving, bungee jumping, mountain climbing
• Children’s – tobogganing, outdoor adventure centre, a ‘snow room’