The brief

A rebrand advocating torture survivors’ voices to be heard

Freedom from Torture is the leading human rights organisation dedicated to the treatment and rehabilitation of torture survivors, offering services across England and Scotland to around 1,000 torture survivors a year. The charity helps survivors to live better, happier lives as a result of their therapies and intervention. After a significant organisational change, the charity was looking to rebrand themselves to represent themselves more accurately both internally and externally.

The main aim of the rebrand was to be more reflective of Freedom from Torture’s status as a leading charity with a global audience that holds torturing states across the world to account and helps survivors to heal here in the UK.

Our solution

The new visual approach is bold in that raising awareness of the existence of torture is important and isn’t shied away from. A powerful association with torture is restraint – whether physical or emotional. Simple graphic lines across the word ‘torture’ create a strong emotive reaction, suggesting both restraint and long-lasting psychological ties but also the crossing out and eradication of torture.

We retained blue as the main colour from the charity’s previous identity, partly for brand recognition and also because we felt that the positive aspects of blue were right for the rebrand – the colour is a calming, safe colour that evokes clear blue skies and freedom. The ‘Empowering Survivors Rebuilding Lives’ strapline sits in the negative space in the logo which further symbolises rebuilding as an important step to freedom.

The services we delivered for the rebrand included:

• Identity and brand architecture
• Brand guidelines
• Organisational material
• Fundraising material
• Signage
• Large format banners