Factory International in Manchester

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.