People deserve to feel safe on the streets. Westminster City Council have collaborated with award-winning creative agency Designhouse on a new borough-wide night-time safety initiative, Night Stars.

The Night Stars initiative launches this month and will see volunteers take to the streets to help ensure people get home safely and receive any assistance they need when on nights out. The initiative will launch in Soho, Leicester Square, Piccadilly, China Town and Shaftesbury Avenue, and will be rolled out across the wider borough at a later stage

To support the initiative Designhouse has created an approachable, distinctive brand designed to help the volunteers stand out from the crowds. The supporting work includes developing the naming, brand identity, look and feel, typography, animation and promotional film all to help build the Night Stars initiative and build its identity as a reassuring presence to the people of Westminster.

At the heart of the visual presentation of the scheme, Designhouse has used a continuous neon pink line to metaphorically reference a person’s journey to safety. The neon draws on the familiar aesthetic of night-time signage and has been used throughout the including in the pink hi-vis jackets worn by volunteers, making them easy to identify.

The continuous neon line travels through all of the brand assets, unifying the brand in a memorable way, providing lots of potential for illustration and animation, and visually uniting all digital and print content. Designhouse also chose to use a handwritten style typeface for the Night Stars logo to reinforce the notion of a human touch underlining the approachable and friendly personality of the initiative.

“Westminster’s nightlife is a safe, inclusive and enjoyable experience for our residents and visitors but for those who do need a helping hand during a night out, the Night Stars are there for you. Our volunteers are an incredible group of selfless individuals who are trained to support members of the public and will help anyone who appears to be in a vulnerable situation,” explained Cllr Rachael Robathan, Leader of Westminster City Council

She continued: “We all need to look out for one another and keep each other safe and the Night Stars, who will be very easy to identify on the streets of the city in their bright pink jackets, is just one of our new projects under our Night Safety campaign.”