VIVIENNE WESTWOOD has been called in to help the rebrand of English National Ballet with a new campaign that shows the ballet dancers wearing the Dame's designs. The campaign aims to "celebrate a fusion of modernity and tradition".
This marks a new direction for the ballet company, led by Artistic Director Tamara Rojo, to "celebrate the traditions of the ballet art form, whilst exploring new ways ballet can be exciting, challenging and open to all".
The English National Ballet are of course famed the world over, but why the rebrand?
"To be the most creative and most loved ballet Company in the UK." Oh, ok then!
"We will achieve this by what we do on stage. By cherishing the traditions of ballet but also by leaping and grasping for the new. By ensuring our artists continue to excite, innovate and challenge. By making it clear that we dance to conjure wonderful, beautiful visions and because we have something to say.
We will also achieve our vision by the collaborations we make – with choreographers, designers, artists, fashion houses and partner organisations.
And finally, we will achieve our vision by the way we present ourselves to the world. We are an ambitious arts organisation, Tamara Rojo’s creative leadership is bold and confident – our image must be so as well."
As well bringing on board Vivienne Westwood to help launch the new brand and direction, the company also worked with creative agency, The Beautiful Meme, to come up with a new logo. The pink, sans serif brand feels almost quite Dutch to me and is much more contemporary than the old logo. That said, I really still like the original logo.
The ballet company go onto speak about the importance of "collaborating with creative people outside of the ballet world".
As far as I can tell though, the collaboration with Vivienne Westwood is purely for campaign and marketing material purposes and I don't think she'll be designing any ballet costumes for actual productions, but perhaps she might feel tempted to follow in the footsteps of the likes of Giles Deacon, who has designed ballet costumes for the English National Ballet previously.
Imagine a Swan Lake production with swans decked out in Vivienne Westwood?!
Queen Michelle
