Why we decided to rebrand

By Pirate Staff / September 07, 2020

The mission at Pirate has always been to break down barriers to creativity.

This was true when we built our first bootstrap studio in Bristol back in 2013 and it remains true today.

Every day a global collective of creatives, musicians, podcasters and dancers find their space between the walls of our studios. A space to play, tell stories and create.

12 months ago, we decided it was time to reassess our brand and create something new that could place our community and its creative spirit at the heart of what we do, what we look like and how we behave.

The first step was to get rid of our corporate logo.

This might seem like a strange thing for a brand to do, but we’ve felt for a while that our logo has become an icon that separates us from our community.

Seeing the Pirate ‘S’ on the wall in so many of the videos you share from the studios each day didn’t sit right. This isn’t our space, it’s your space. So the logo has gone. Instead, our URL is our calling card, it’s how people know who we are and where to find us.

The rooms in all of our sites moving forward (including Dalston and Hackney) will be neutral. Dress them however you like.

The next step was to give ourselves a new identity. One that would champion our community in a way that feels honest.

You’re a diverse and dynamic bunch with an eclectic mix of creative pursuits, and we wanted our identity to reflect that. Our imagery is now a celebration of your dynamism - expect to see less brand and more you.

Similarly, our brand font is something many of you probably use every day too; Arial. Why Arial? Pirate is all about democratising creative space, and Arial feels like the most democratic font around. In using what’s readily available, we’ve been able to bootstrap it and make it our own. We’ve stretched it, flipped it and got creative with it, but it’ll always be Arial (feel free to have a play around with it too).

We’ve also reimagined our approach to content. Over the coming weeks, you’ll start to see stories from within our community come to life on our social feeds and website.

We’ve been talking to podcasters, dancers, bands, DJs and producers - all of you have something interesting to say and we want to use our platform to help you say it.

But it’s not just an aesthetic change.

We’ve made a commitment that everything we do, and every decision we make must empower artists. If it doesn’t, we simply won’t do it. We’ve got loads of exciting initiatives we’re working on to bring this commitment to life - expect announcements over the coming months.

Oh, we’ve also dropped studios from our name. We’re now simply Pirate. Many of you (and the majority of Pirate staff) have been calling us this since the start, so it felt like the right thing to do.

We hope you like the new look.

Pirate x