National Museum Australia

Identity, Visual language, Illustration, Art direction
agency_Generation Alliance
National Museum of Australia logo with its speech bubble mark on cream
The line Where our stories live, handwritten above the speech bubble mark
Illustrated speech bubbles shown on a desktop monitor
Style guide pages for the museum identity
Two bus shelter posters showing families against chalk-style lettering
A man wearing a Where our stories live t-shirt, and a speech bubble name badge
Three programme brochures: Join the conversation, What's on and Friends of the Museum
Our Stories brochure and spread with a collage of historical photographs

AGDA Award for identity 2012

A celebration of Australian social history, the National Museum of Australia (NMA) explores the land, nation and people of Australia. It does so in a unique way by revealing the stories of ordinary and extraordinary Australians, promoting the exploration of knowledge and ideas.

In conjunction with their 10th anniversary in 2011, NMA wanted to create a new brand identity to reflect the Museum’s recently revised vision, positioning and strategic direction. With the challenge of how to change perceptions of the NMA as a place of discovery, not just of learning, our goal was to develop a new identity that encapsulated the essence of NMA as ‘a place that celebrates our people and culture of storytellers’.

The result was an identity that connects the themes of storytelling, sharing and celebrating with a speech bubble mark that serves as an invitation to be part of the story by continuing the conversation about Australia’s people, history and future. In short, it reflected a place ‘where our stories live’.

The project involved:

  • Identity creation
  • Identity guidelines
  • Illustration
  • Art direction of a photoshoot