Daphne Jackson Trust rebrand

The challenge

The organisation’s visual identity had remained largely unchanged for almost a decade and, without formal brand guidelines or a consistent framework in place, communications had become fragmented across channels.

Alongside refreshing the brand, the Trust also needed a new website that could better support its growing audience and evolving offer. The existing site had become difficult to maintain, overly text-heavy and increasingly cluttered, particularly on mobile. Accessibility, navigation and content structure all needed significant improvement.

Our brief was to modernise the logo, refine the tone of voice, and create an inclusive, accessible identity system that could work confidently across digital, print and events. The new brand also needed to sit naturally alongside the Trust’s existing photography while helping communicate a clearer, more empowering message about returning to careers in research.

The process

We began with a discovery phase focused on audience insight, user journeys and sector research, helping us understand both the Trust’s communications challenges and the needs of its varied audiences, from Fellows and applicants to sponsors, hosts and policy stakeholders.

From there, we developed a more cohesive strategic and visual direction designed to improve clarity, accessibility and recognition – we challenged the ‘refresh’ requirement in the brief by producing modernised versions of the logo as well as something completely different. To truly answer the brief we felt there was space to grow beyond the old identity, and the more daring, brand new approach was met with huge positivity with stakeholders, and was taken forward. 

Alongside the visual identity work, we refined the organisation’s tone of voice to bring greater warmth, optimism and confidence to its communications, helping shape a more empowering narrative around returning to research careers.

A key part of the project was the complete redesign of the Trust’s website. We restructured the site architecture and streamlined navigation to improve usability across devices, while ensuring accessibility, performance and content flexibility were embedded throughout the experience. The new approach also made it easier for the internal team to update and manage content independently.