WHITBY·SIGNAL ON AIR · EST 2017
Whitby Signal · Independent Creative Studio 54.4906° N · 0.6131° W · North Yorkshire Issue №024 ·

Broadcasting
brands from
the edge.

Whitby Signal is an independent brand, design and film studio working with founders, institutions and challenger brands across the UK and Europe. We transmit strategy, identity, editorial and moving image from a converted coastguard station on the North Yorkshire coast.

Selected work → Begin a brief →
24 projects · 7 industries · 1 coastguard station
S/01 · Index

A contents page for the studio, in the order we recommend reading it.

S/02 · Manifesto

We believe brands need a signal —
not noise.

Our work transmits from the literal edge of the country, and that geography is not incidental. The coast demands clarity. There is no room for the second draft, the vague brief, the campaign that could have been made anywhere. We make work that could only have been made for the client in front of us.

Written Whitby, March 2024 Revised Annually · v.07 Authored Studio, unanimous
01 /

Signal over noise.

A brand is a transmission. It either arrives, clear and unmistakable, or it does not. We do not make work designed to be admired in a portfolio; we make work designed to be received, intact, by the person it was meant for. If a piece cannot survive compression — a billboard glimpsed at speed, a half-watched pre-roll — it is not yet finished.

02 /

The long horizon.

Most agency work is optimised for the launch and the case-study film that follows it. We are optimised for year three, when the identity has been pressure-tested by a new product line, a leadership change, a journalist's question. We design systems that compound — that look more coherent at year five than they did at year one.

03 /

Editorial thinking.

Before we are designers or film-makers, we are editors. The hardest part of any brand is not what to include but what to cut. We bring the discipline of long-form journalism — fact-checking, source-attribution, the ruthless cutting of adjectives — to every brief, regardless of medium. A logo is a sentence. A campaign is a paragraph.

04 /

The edge as vantage.

Whitby is not London. It is not Brooklyn. It is not a satellite of any other creative centre, and we do not pretend to be. The edge is a vantage: you see the field differently from here, you hear the market differently, and you are not tempted to make work that flatters your neighbours. We recommend the edge to anyone who will listen.

S/03 · Selected Work

Six recent transmissions, each with a field report attached.

North Sea Gin Co. identity
Identity · Film · Packaging
№ 01
Client North Sea Gin Co. Year 2024 Sector Spirits

North Sea Gin Co.

A complete identity and packaging system for a Whitby-distilled gin, built around the mariner's concept of "fathoms" — six depth markers, each a different expression. The campaign film was shot on a North Sea trawler in February, in 4:3, on a single 50mm lens.

Identity Packaging Film Editorial Trade Activation
Transmission Report REF · NSG-24-03
Off-trade sales (YoY)
+47%
Distribution (UK stockists)
412 → 1,140
Brand recall (unprompted, region)
+22pp
Source NIQ scan data, Q3 2024 Period Mar–Sep 2024
Saltburn Film Festival
Identity · Campaign · Print
№ 02
Client Saltburn Film Festival Year 2024 Sector Culture

Saltburn Film Festival

The third edition of a regional independent festival, themed around "the long take." Identity, programme design, poster series, and a campaign film cut from a single 9-minute unbroken tracking shot along the town's cliff lift.

Identity Editorial Poster Series Film Wayfinding
Transmission Report REF · SFF-24-06
Ticket sales (vs 2023)
3.2 ×
Press coverage (column cm)
14,200
Sell-out screenings
17 / 22
Source Box office, festival office Period Jun 2024
Esk & Vale Tourism
Strategy · Identity · Digital
№ 03
Client Esk & Vale Tourism Partnership Year 2023 Sector Public · Tourism

Esk & Vale.

A regional tourism strategy and identity for the Esk Valley and Vale of Pickering, built around the idea of "slow country." Twelve village identities nested inside a single system. Wayfinding installed across 180km of footpath.

Strategy Identity Wayfinding Web Print
Transmission Report REF · EVTP-23-09
Incremental visitors (annual)
+280k
Dwell time (avg, days)
2.1 → 3.4
Local SME adoption
94%
Source STEAM report, 2024 Period May–Oct 2023
Stoker Books
Identity · Editorial · Web
№ 04
Client Stoker Books Year 2024 Sector Publishing

Stoker Books.

Identity, jacket system and digital storefront for an independent publisher of slow horror and folk non-fiction, founded in Whitby in 2022. Each jacket is set in a single typeface — a modified Plantin — and uses only the colour of unbleached paper and a single ink.

Identity Editorial Jacket Design E-commerce
Transmission Report REF · STK-24-02
Direct subscription growth
+312%
Awards (design)
D&AD Wood Pencil
Repeat purchase rate
61%
Source Publisher records Period 2024 YTD
Headland Heritage
Identity · Campaign · Film
№ 05
Client Headland Heritage Trust Year 2023 Sector Heritage

Headland Heritage.

Identity, membership campaign and three films for a charitable trust caring for six historic properties along the Cleveland Way. The campaign asked one question of its audience: "what will you hand back?" — and grew membership by two-thirds in a single season.

Identity Campaign Film Membership
Transmission Report REF · HHT-23-04
Membership growth (YoY)
+62%
Under-35 members
14% → 38%
Campaign reach (organic)
2.1M
Source Trust membership DB Period Apr–Sep 2023
Tideglass
Brand · Web · Investor Comms
№ 06
Client Tideglass Year 2024 Sector Marine Tech

Tideglass.

Brand strategy, identity and investor communications for a Hartlepool-founded marine telemetry startup whose sensors monitor offshore wind arrays. The brief: make invisible infrastructure legible to a non-technical investor in under 90 seconds. We did it in 70.

Strategy Identity Web Investor Comms Data Viz
Transmission Report REF · TDG-24-11
Series A secured
£14.2M
Investor meetings → 2nd call
73%
Brand comprehension (investor survey)
9.1 / 10
Source Company filings Period Jan–Jun 2024
S/04 · Capabilities

Six disciplines, practised in-house, with no outsourced thinking.

S/05 · Method

A five-phase engagement. Typically 14 to 22 weeks, end to end.

PH/01

Listen

Stakeholder interviews, customer interviews, market and competitive analysis. We do not start the visual work until we can write the brief better than the client can. The deliverable here is a sharper question, not a prettier answer.

Weeks 1–3
Interviews × 12
Audit deck
Sharp brief
PH/02

Locate

Positioning, narrative, naming (if required), tone of voice. We locate the brand in its market, in its audience's life, and in its own category. By the end of this phase, we have a single sentence the whole project can be tested against.

Weeks 3–6
Strategy deck
Narrative brief
Voice principles
PH/03

Encode

Identity, design system, editorial framework, film direction. The translation of strategy into material. Three rounds, each narrower than the last. We do not present infinite options; we present the work we would defend.

Weeks 6–14
Identity system
Design system
Editorial framework
PH/04

Transmit

Production, build, launch. Files released, site shipped, campaign rolled out. We do not vanish at deployment. The core team stays attached through the first six weeks of the work being in the world, on retainer or fixed-fee.

Weeks 14–20
Production
Build & ship
Launch comms
PH/05

Read

Post-launch measurement, against the metrics we agreed in phase one. What did the market hear? What did the data show? What would we do differently? We write this report whether or not the client asks for it.

Weeks 20–22
Field report
Metrics review
Next-phase brief
Listen · 3w Locate · 3w Encode · 8w Transmit · 6w Read · 2w
S/06 · Dispatches

Recent notes from the studio — talks, essays, transmissions of consequence.

S/07 · Studio

A coastguard station,
still on watch.

The studio occupies the former West Cliff coastguard station, built in 1894 and decommissioned in 2005. We bought the lease in 2017, restored the lantern room as a film-editing suite, and kept the original semaphore mast on the roof — it now carries our Wi-Fi antennas and a single amber lamp, lit when the studio is occupied.

Twelve of us work here full-time. We are not a remote studio, though we have a small flat above the harbour for collaborators coming down from London or Edinburgh. We open the doors to students on the first Friday of every month.

Latitude54.4906° N
Longitude0.6131° W
Time zoneGMT / BST
OS gridNZ 898 113
StationWhitby West Cliff
Built1894
Transmission Radius · Active Updated 02:14 GMT
Whitby Signal · Source Glasgow Edinburgh Newcastle London Amsterdam Paris Cardiff Dublin Belfast
Working hours
08:30 — 18:00
Monday to Thursday. Friday is a studio day — no client calls, no external meetings. We use it to read, edit, and walk the cliffs.
Studio capacity
12 · 4 · 2
Twelve permanent staff, four resident collaborators, two floating desks for visiting clients and journalists. No hot-desking.
Engagements per year
9 — 11
A deliberate limit. We take on fewer than ten projects a year so that each can be staffed by a partner and a senior creative from start to finish.
Average tenure
4.7 yrs
Of permanent staff. We hire slowly. The shortest tenure in the studio is two years; the longest is eight, which is the studio's full age.
S/08 · People

Twelve permanent staff. No freelancers in the core team.

S/09 · Begin a Brief

Send us a
signal.

For new engagements, press, talks and general correspondence. We reply to every brief within two working days — typically with a question, not a pitch. New projects begin with a 60-minute call, in person where possible, at the studio.

Studio hello@whitbysignal.com
New work brief@whitbysignal.com
Press press@whitbysignal.com
Tel +44 (0)1947 880 114
Post Whitby Signal, Old Coastguard Station, West Cliff, Whitby, YO21 3EX
Strategy Identity Editorial Film Web Campaign Naming Packaging
We reply within 2 working days.