Factory International commissions, produces and presents a year-round programme of original creative work and special events. It also stages the city-wide biannual Manchester International Festival. Since 2018, North have been working with Peter Saville on the visual identity development of both the Manchester International Festival and Factory International.

In October 2023, Factory International presented its first official public performance. This event also marked the official opening of its landmark new architecture in Manchester: Aviva Studios, designed by OMA (Office for Metropolitan Architecture).

In an interview, Ellen van Loon, OMA Partner and Lead Architect describes the building:

This will be a new type of performance space – a unique crossover between a fixed theatre and flexible warehouse. Super-sized moveable walls enable endless configurations within a large space, allowing audiences unexpected vistas of performers. I hope that whenever people come to visit they always experience something different, as if with each visit they encounter a different building.

In an article about the project, It’s Nice That quotes North about the visual identity:

The symbol also denotes creative potential, as North describes in a release: “the symbol represents the space, the opportunity, the blank canvas; a new factory where the art of the future will be made”. It comes alive in animations, warping and transforming to adapt to various identities for events and different outputs, “evolving like the building itself” and forming an anchor to most visual content across the identity.

The font used is the same one North deployed for the last three MIFs, a monospace cut of Gräebenbach by Camelot, which the studio says lends a “machine-like functionality” to the information. Meanwhile, Gräebenbach Mono Black uppercase is used for headlines for “maximum standout and personality”.

Peter Saville, Co-founder of Factory Records and Creative Adviser, sees the factory as:

I see Factory International, and its new home, as a two-way portal between Manchester and the world, through the broadest medium of the arts. The world comes in through it and Manchester goes out through it. It is itself a signifier of intent and ambition, so it’s inspiring.

Take a closer look at the archutecture of the studios in a fly-through video on YouTube.

Brand launch film

Ticker tape information system is being used on the website and on the building

Landing page of factoryinternational.org, April 2025

Visual identity launch campaign

Luca Guadagnino’s 2022 film Bones and All uses Archivio Tipografico’s version of Aldo Novarese’s Nova Augustea as a supporting type. The logo is based on Trajan, with some added weight, reducing its stroke contrast. The credits on the poster appear to be set in Antonio.

Titles and graphics for the film were done by Peter Saville and Paul Hetherington.
Poster design artwork credit: Paolo Restifo

1977–1980: Substance is not only an excellent compilation of rare Joy Divison songs, but also the most famous example of Wim Crouwel's New Alphabet in use. With the “over-the-top and never meant to be really used” typeface, to use the words of the author, the cover quickly became a cult classic that splits opinon to this date. Yet this debate always seems to get stuck on the aesthetics of the type, and not the fact that it actually says “subst1mce”.

The serif is Stempel Garamond, with Garamond 3 used for the oldstyle figures. [petersaville.info]
Art direction: Peter Saville
Design: Brett Wickens, Peter Saville Associates

CD cover

Based on the 1922 Klingspor model by German designer Rudolf Koch, this hand-drawn quill roman has an informal and curiously delicate appearance. The typeface was known in Germany as Koch-Antiqua and in the rest of Europe as Locarno. Eve, as it was called in the United States, continues to enjoy great popularity in advertising and book publishing circles.

Wikipedia:

Bryan Ferry’s girlfriend (and soon to be wife) Lucy Helmore appeared on the album cover […] wearing a medieval helmet with a falcon perched on her gloved hand, evoking King Arthur’s last journey to the mysterious land of Avalon.

Eve is one of my favourites by the master Rudolf Koch. I found this by accident — I’m not into Roxy Music, but a fan of Rudolf Koch for sure!

The inner sleeve was designed by Peter Saville.

“The artwork, done by Peter Saville, is based on a poster by Italian Futurist Fortunato Depero for the 1932 exposition Futurismo Trentino. Saville adapted it so that the ‘F’ stands for Factory and the ‘L’ (Roman numeral) for 50. The album colour in the UK was blue with blue artwork, while in the US it was white with burgundy artwork.” — Discogs

Canadian release.

Back cover from EMI Australia release.

Back cover from CBS Records Australia release.

Canadian casette cover from Polygram used Kabel Black and Univers instead of Elegant Grotesk.

12-inch vinyl promo

From Wikipedia:

“1963” (sometimes stylized as “Nineteen63”) is a track by English rock group New Order. It was originally released as a B-side to “True Faith” in 1987 and appeared on the Substance compilation of the same year. It was then released as a single in January 1995, in a radio mix by Arthur Baker.

[More info on Discogs]

CD box

Alternative cover

CD promo

For Pulp’s final album in 2001, Peter Saville contrasted two very different typographic styles — intricate floral letters cut by hand into wood, and plastic label tape stamped by a machine.

The large letters come from at least two designs (the ‘P’s are from different alphabets) in a decorative wood type series by the Louis John Pouchée foundry who was active in the early 1800s. As far as I know, no one has digitized these alphabets and they can only be seen in their original form in Ornamented Types: Twenty-three alphabets from the foundry of Louis John Pouchée, a 1990–94 printed specimen published by I.M. Imprimit with a very limited edition, or as reproductions in Nicolet(t)e Gray’s Nineteenth Century Ornamented Types and Title Pages where Pouchée’s type is attributed to the Wood & Sharwoods London foundry. You can also see some glimpses of the I. M. Imprimit specimen in this clip from the film Typeface.

Lettres Ombrées Ornées is a similar design but is based on a slab serif model and is much less varied in its ornamentation.

“We Love Life” is made not with a font, but with a labeler (such as a DYMO) that stamps letters into plastic tape. But global promotional materials used various fonts derived from these label machines, including FF Dynamoe and Chromosome,

Printed credits:
Design: Howard Wakefield and Marcus Werner Hed
Art direction: Peter Saville and Jarvis Cocker

According to PulpWiki, non-UK versions of the album have autumnal colors rather than green.

Australian promo poster using Chromosome.

Promo poster using the FF Dynamoe font rather than physical label tape.

Swedish promo poster also using FF Dynamoe.

Sleeve for the 12″ single, Factory Records, 1981

From the article on Codex 99:

After Ian [Curtis]’s death the remaining members of Joy Division regrouped as New Order. For their first single [Peter] Saville continued the neoclassical theme using Berthold Wolpe’s Albertus (the “Veritas hound” is directly from a 1937 type specimen). As he later said “I wanted it to have the feel of a package purchased in a religious store:”

[More info on Discogs]

Alternative sleeve with embossed design

Alternative sleeve for a reissue

Cover for a limited edition 4-track 12″ vinyl single issued for Record Store Day 2011, featuring both the New Order and Joy Division versions of “Ceremony” and “In A Lonely Place”