The Walter and Eliza Hall institute celebrated their 100th birthday by holding a festival in the centre of Melbourne during August 2015. The 'Science in the square' festival brought science to life through an illuminating program of art, comedy, film and public talks.
The festival brand depicted all four events as dynamic squares. Images for each event explode out of the squares towards the viewer. An unconventional colour scheme leveraged fluro orange to grab attention and differentiate the festival within Melbourne's event-heavy calendar.
Hero images for each event positioned the different activities to appropriate sub-audiences.
A unifying association to the festival was maintained with common brand elements. The imagery generated energy, curiosity and entertained.
A unifying association to the festival was maintained with common brand elements. The imagery generated energy, curiosity and entertained.
The institute promoted the festival directly, in addition to leveraging supporter channels. Awareness of the festival was raised through projections from the main screen at Federation Square, online advertising, social media posts, supply of images to promoters and large format street posters.
The science stage show had unique requirements such as a set design and question cards for the MC, Paul McDermott. Particularly challenging was the spelling bee competition, where letters were added live on screen as contestants uttered them. Luckily difficult situations can result in unexpected, but successful solutions!
The festival hosted over 2000 visitors during its duration. Of these visitors, at least 13% had not heard of the institute before attending, and 2% subscribed to the institute's newsletter. Awareness of the institute amongst Victorians increased by four percentage points during the period that the festival was held, which is a 9% raise in awareness.
