The Clearing is delighted to announce the new visual and verbal identity for Ascot, the iconic British racecourse and proud home of Royal Ascot. The new elements will be rolled out over the next 18 months, and can already be seen on Ascot's website www.ascot.co.uk

Ascot has long attracted the world's finest horses and jockeys, but was struggling to make further inroads into the consumer leisure market. Royal Ascot, the racecourse's flagship summer occasion, was overshadowing its regular race meetings. The Clearing has created a new brand positioning and promise of Raise the standard ’ making tradition meaningful in new ways.

The new identity system creates one cohesive destination brand ’ Ascot ’ that can flex to deliver a luxury social and sporting event, Royal Ascot. Sam Wall, Design Director at The Clearing said: "We started by making the logos feel more considered; they now work more cleanly and easily for digital and print. As part of this, the shared crown symbol was re-crafted in a way that still retains its regal heritage.

The new tone of voice uses storytelling to put the history and heritage of the racecourse back at the heart of the brand, to show how a day at Ascot is unlike any other.

The Clearing also redefined colours, fonts, and image style, and introduced a new graphic pattern. Sam Wall, Design Director at The Clearing continues, "The new complementary system continues through the rest of the identity. The traditional Ascot blue is now a deeper shade, with an entirely new secondary palette to create energy and depth. Royal Ascot now uses gold as the lead colour, with a premium cream that acts as a canvas. The primary font for Ascot is a more contemporary sans serif, with a serif secondary font. For Royal Ascot, the serif takes precedence, to reflect the race meeting's heritage. Both now also share a new style of imagery that's altogether richer, elegant and sophisticated. This richness runs all the way through the physical collateral, from the quality of paper stock to details like foiling and spot varnishing."

You can see more of the work we've done for Ascot here.

Read what It's Nice That, Under Consideration and Design Week had to say about our project.