2018 Winners & Shortlists

The Campaign

Local knowledge revealed that to Arabs, calligraphy is art. Since our positioning was 'The Art of Performance' we decided to turn the brandline into art itself. We wanted to show them 'The Art of Jaguar'.

Creative Execution

We enlisted the expertise of Wissam Shawkat, a renowned Iraqi calligrapher, who skillfully managed to create a piece of art from the Arabic version of the brandline. Every masterful stroke had creativity and meaning, that resonated deeply with our Arab audience. The design was revealed as part of a multimedia projection on the Burj Khalifa, the tallest building in the world. It was then publicly revealed as a Facebook post during the Holy Month of Ramadan. The logo was accompanied by a 'making of' video which showed the thought and process that went into its creation.

Indication of how successful the outcome was in the market

While there is no quantifiable way to show the impact of a typographic logo in brand perception, Jaguar has received a lot of positive comments from fans, appreciating the art. Internally, this was no small achievement as it involved extensive rounds of permissions from Jaguar in the UK to approve the creation of the first-ever calligraphic logo in the 95-year history of the brand.

Our target audience was local and expat Arabs, over 35 years old, who were luxury car buyers. They appreciated the finer things in life and art was definitely one of them. We wanted them to feel that Jaguar understood them and wasn't as English as they imagined. Simply translating 'The Art of Performance' into Arabic wasn't the answer. We needed to make a connection with them - one that would make them see that we appreciate art just as much as they do.