Member Article

London Marathon refreshes its brand with Manchester's Dept

London Marathon Events (LME), the organiser of thirteen world-class mass participation events each year, including the ‘world’s greatest marathon’, has launched a fresh look for the London Marathon and its newly developed website.

In a non-Covid world, every year LME organises 13 world-leading, mass participation events in running, cycling and swimming that inspire more than 200,000 participants. Its portfolio of world-class events includes the Virgin Money London Marathon, the world’s greatest marathon, and RideLondon, the world’s greatest festival of cycling.

LME turned to the Manchester division of international digital agency Dept to guide the brand refresh for LME and its events and to develop a centralised solution for managing its portfolio of websites. The first phase of the project involved its flagship event, the London Marathon. The event’s refreshed branding has now been rolled out across the new London Marathon website built on Sitecore Experience Platform.

Jason Ochoa, Head of Digital at LME, said: “We appointed Dept for their ability to combine creativity and technology. The agency’s understanding of our organisation and our values means our new website and branding truly reflect the hundreds of thousands of people we inspire to get active every year. Our teams have enjoyed collaborating with Dept on both the creative and technical aspects of the project and look forward to continuing our work together.”

The London Marathon attracts a diverse range of people from across the world. Inspired by the achievements of elite athletes and general participants alike, Dept crafted a refreshed brand for the London Marathon that celebrates their moments of emotion and achievement; from embarking on their first training runs to the intensity of crossing the finishing line.

Dept designed custom patterns inspired by the marathon; a unique set of geometric designs to represent the ground the athletes run on, the landmarks they see en-route, and the thousands of steps they take to the finish line. Lines are placed at a precise 26.2-degree angle, exactly matching the mileage of the marathon.

The introduction of statement patterns, vivid colours, clear typefaces and a branded photography style has revived the London Marathon’s identity and achieved coherence across its entire brand estate.

Dept applied the refreshed brand on the first of eight websites it’s designing and building for LME. Built on the Sitecore Experience Platform, LME now has the building blocks for advanced personalisation, scalability, and an improved user experience. Dept took a headless approach to the architecture, ensuring LME has the flexibility to change how its websites look, where content is placed, and how it appears on different devices, all without needing any development support.

UK Managing Director at Dept, Brian Robinson, said: “Dept set out to deliver a solution that not only meets the needs of LME today, but will also integrate with new technologies and continuously evolve and scale as the organisation grows. The future-ready solution delivers an exceptional digital experience, while offering the scalability that LME needs.”

The London Marathon website was the first to launch on its new platform.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Dept .