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About

These guidelines have been created by the Barbican Studio, which is the in-house design team at the Barbican Centre, London. The Studio creates most of the visual material for the Centre. It is based in the Marketing Department and consists of four permanent designers.

The current structure of the design team was created in 2011 and coincides with a major rebranding project undertaken by North. The philosophy of the team is based on the visual guidelines North created at the time. These set out a flexible system influenced by the Centre’s vision of ‘arts without boundaries’ and includes strong visual elements that allow freedom and diversity.

For further information contact design@barbican.org.uk

Browse

Chapter
0.0 Our Voice 1.0 Invite 2.0 Show 3.0 Passion 4.0 Examples 5.0 Recap 6.0 Accessibility
Page
0.0.1 Intro 0.0.2 Values 0.0.3 Principles
1.0.1 Intro 1.0.2 Everyday 1.0.3 Personal 1.0.4 Shorten 1.0.5 Artspeak 1.0.6 Test
2.0.1 Imagine 2.0.2 Attention 2.0.3 Start 2.0.4 Concise 2.0.5 Qualifiers
3.0.1 Intro 3.0.2 Tell 3.0.3 Ask 3.0.4 Rhythm 3.0.5 Variety
4.0.1 Intro 4.0.2 Homepage 4.0.3 Season 4.0.4 Advert 4.0.5 Notice 4.0.6 Invite 4.0.7 Poster 4.0.8 Hire 4.0.9 Response 4.1.0 Report 4.1.1 Exhibition
5.0.1 Audiences 5.0.2 Cheatsheet
6.0.1 Language 6.0.2 Jargon 6.0.3 Headings 6.0.4 Links 6.0.5 Opinions 6.0.6 Images
Artspeak

Watch out for ‘artspeak’

Talking about art and culture means we sometimes need to use complex language like ‘twelve-tone composition’ or ‘abstract expressionism’.

That’s not a problem — so long as we ask if our reader might need more information (like someone new to classical music).

But we need to watch out for ‘artspeak’ words like ‘interrogate’ or ‘notions’. They make us sound stuffy and academic, which puts some people off visiting.

Try to translate ‘artspeak’ into simpler, more everyday language:

This exhibition interrogates contemporary notions of masculinity => What exactly does ‘masculinity’ mean today?

Invite everybody in
1.0.5