City slickers

By Gena Tuffery, November 30, 2007 @ 5:58 am

They may be making our tourism ads over there, but we’re branding their cities back here. Wellington’s Origin Design has just rebranded a New South Wales mini-metropolis after winning a pitch against two Australian agencies. “We just came to it with more of an open mind,” says Origin director and designer Brian Slade.

It’s not hard to have an open mind when it’s empty—initially, no one on the team had gone walkabout in the ancient Aboriginal settlement. In fact, no one even knew where Albury was. After a dash across the ditch, Slade can now confirm that Albury City is “a lush green basin in a sea of dust”.

Origin took that green and splashed it everywhere, giving the city a distinctive ‘graphic voice’. And it’s doing some big talking. Slade reports that while there were some initial concerns about a Kiwi company getting the job, after the results were unveiled they were told, “If you were over here we’d throw you a street parade.”

“We were pretty happy with the offer,” says Slade. “Usually we just get a bottle of wine.”