V&A – Designing Club Culture

Too Gallus was approached by V&A Dundee to pitch for their upcoming exhibition ‘Night Fever: Designing Club Culture’, a six-month show coming from the Vitra Museum, Switzerland. As a studio who cut their teeth designing all things club related, from hosting club events and numerous subcultures, it was a brief that could not be missed. After a successful pitch process, Too Gallus was appointed to the project. Tasked with branding the exhibition, creating a strong visual identity that holds up across sound, motion and visuals. Encompassing the variety and scale of the exhibition, Too Gallus knew a one size fits all approach would not work. Instead they opted for a flexible brand identity, tapping into cultural significance of each area to create an immersive audio, visual and sensory experience. Research led Too Gallus to decide that the best way to tell this story would be through 3D visualisation of neon signage, building out a multi-era landscape. Neon signs hold a strong relationship to clubbing culture, from the iconic bulbs of Studio 54 to the ultra modern lines found in Ibiza’s superclubs. Due to the target audience being so vast, and everyone having their own clubbing experiences the identity meant that everyone could feel like the exhibition was relatable. Reminding some of the roots of their favourite clubs and hitting nostalgic notes for others, this flexible and dynamic approach keeps identity engaging over long periods of time as has scope to stay relevant over exhibition lifespan. ngside the exhibition identity, Too Gallus were also asked to design a range of merchandise to be sold at the exhibition.  To avoid the usual gift shops tropes, they based their designs off of the identity without just pasting an image of the poster on the front, creating truly wearable pieces.