Indoor Sports Centre

University of Bristol

While renovating the University of Bristol’s Indoor Sports Centre, Oxford Architects asked us to design signage for the vibrant, new space. The £4.9 million makeover includes a new sports medicine clinic on the ground floor with consultation rooms providing therapies such as sports massage and acupuncture. There are also counselling rooms for the University’s Healthy Minds programme, a gym spanning two floors and new studios for fitness classes.

While deciding on a colour scheme and designs for the signage, it was important to adhere to the existing University brand guidelines. At the same time we needed to incorporate elements of the sports centre brand identity, which had a strong personality of its own. So we worked with both styles to create our signage system. And we gave our designs a unique twist by using familiar sports materials in an usual way. This included yoga mats which added bright colours and an element of fun to the sports brand.

We created a large wayfinding system (above) to indicate different floors using wallpaper with colourful images. Yoga mats were cut to shape then sandwiched between the wallpaper and a sheet of acrylic. Vinyl directional signage was then applied on top. And in the stairwells additional signage featured well-known sports people from the University (past and present). These had inspiring quotes along with information and photographs.

Meanwhile functional signage throughout the building used the existing University of Bristol brand. This also incorporated shapes cut out from yoga mats and included a layer of painted acrylic. Brand colours can also been seen in the lines digitally printed onto frosted vinyl and added to windows and doors. In addition to wayfinding signage we worked with the University communication team to come up with messaging for fun and decorative walls. These displayed a range of motivational messages on colourful backgrounds.

We used yoga mats along with bungee chords commonly used in exercise equipment, for feedback messaging walls (see below). These were spaces for students to make their own. Project Graphics translated this concept into reality by building framed wall panels that cleverly held together the mats and tightly threaded bungee chords.

Digitally printed banners in a range of colours were designed for the running track on the third floor. The same graphic illustrations were used on the windows so you can get a glimpse of the activities inside. A great opportunity for advertising the sports centre.

Interactive motivational wall

As well as signage for the sports centre we designed three games to create interactive walls of motivation. These included ‘Smash It’ which displays common excuses that people use to avoid exercise (see above). Players have to jump and move quickly to ‘smash’ each phrase and get a point with each hit. Points feed into a leader board motivating others to beat the highest score.

Other games designed for the sports centre include ‘Slap It’ which is a digital hand painting activity to encourage exercise. Meanwhile the ‘Inspire Me’ activity uses hand movements to reveal hidden motivational messages (see below). The refurbished Indoor Sports Centre officially opened on 10 October, 2018 and has already seen a marked increase in membership and visits.