ABOUT

Recognizing excellence in packaging design, Pentawards has been inspiring the creative community for over 15 years through its annual awards programme, events, and more.

In 2020, Vault49 Co-Founder John Glasgow was invited to speak at the Pentawards Festival and joined the international awards jury. At the beginning of 2023, John was appointed Co-President of the jury, and the Vault49 team was asked to be Pentawards' creative partner for the year.

Their challenge to us? Create a new visual identity and campaign for Pentawards 2023.

Our solution? Transform Pentawards into a creative canvas for change.

Setting the brief to everyone at Vault49, we brought together inspiration and ideas from people across teams in our New York and London studios to build our initial creative concepts. The result is a true team collaboration that's bold, distinctive, and disruptive.

Drawing on graffiti in NYC and London, the design language associated with protest and activism, and Vault49’s roots in street art and craft, we’ve created a visual identity and campaign assets that inspires the global creative community to make positive change.

“We wanted to communicate that any one of us can use creativity to make our mark on society in a positive way or express a desire for change. Our visual identity uses bold colours and typography to reference homemade protest slogans and placards, while the repetition of graphics is reminiscent of the guerrilla art of fly-posting. Many of the designs have been ‘hi-jacked’ with hand-crafted elements like stencil graffiti spontaneously spray-painted on top, communicating immediacy, rawness, and a human touch.” - Lucie Mouchet, Design Director at Vault49.

Hi-jacking the Pentawards logo on the website in this distinct new style, it is symbolic of Pentawards’ ongoing commitment to helping drive positive change through the power of creativity and design.

“It was important that the identity not only communicated the positive change Pentawards are helping to achieve across the industry, but that it also felt like an authentic expression of who we are at Vault49. For example, Vault49 was born out of a street art collective and our team still includes screenprinters, graffiti artists, illustrators and typographers. When the Black Lives Matter protests started in 2020, we knew we had to get involved, and designed and screen-printed thousands of posters to hand out at the protests to amplify the messages. In creating this visual identity for Pentawards, we’ve brought our own story, values and heritage together to unite behind a common mission of how design can enact positive change. We hope this will inspire other designers around the world to do the same in a way that feels most authentic to them." - John Glasgow, Co-Founder of Vault49 & Co-President of Pentawards Jury 2023.

Launched at the beginning of the year, our visual identity and campaign assets will continue to roll out across all competition materials and communications, including the Pentawards website, social media, competition user and entry guides, newsletters, and animations.

“We love how Vault49’s design for this year’s Pentawards competition is a call-to-action for the global creative community to use their craft to help create a better world. Whether it be through designing more inclusive packaging, innovating in materials that promote sustainability, or using graphic design or smart technology to spotlight important social issues or initiatives, it is highlighting the huge opportunity for designers to help galvanise positive change in consumers’ lives around the world.” - Adam Ryan, Head of Pentawards.