SODA – Manchester Metropolitan University.

In 2017, Manchester Metropolitan University came to us with an entirely new concept for UK higher education. SODA, the School of Digital Arts, is the first university school to bring science/engineering and arts/humanities subjects under one roof. The challenge? Establishing this hybrid institution’s position in the market and creating a brand that would resonate with students who’d never encountered anything like it before.

Through research and market insight, we worked closely with the team to establish SODA’s target markets, competitors and position in the market. This brand position has also been used to inform the school’s teaching and research curriculum – shaping not just what SODA looks and sounds like, but its teaching and research agenda, too. A naming strategy followed, running in parallel with stakeholder focus groups, industry engagement (with 700 businesses working with the university), digital analysis and user testing.

This digital-first identity is animated, youth-focused and diverse, with both written and visual language designed to resonate with the teenagers who became SODA’s first cohort. Alongside the identity we created: an animated logo; brand copy; a promotional film (storyboard, script, art direction and motion design, with a voiceover recorded with university alumna, actor Zawe Ashton); website; launch materials; print; social media content, and an events strategy. 

In 2021, the £35m new-build school opened. Today, it teaches everything from photography and filmmaking to VR, AR, UX design and ‘technology for good’. SODA also won the RIBA North West Award 2023, establishing itself as a successful new model for interdisciplinary education.