Dark Skies
Norfolk is blessed with one of the least light-polluted stretches of coastline in England. Standing on the heathland at Kelling or looking north from Wiveton Downs on a clear autumn night will give keen stargazers a chance to see the Milky Way with the naked eye. The northern lights can also be seen from this coastline, making it a mecca for stargazers and skywatchers.
Our client NCPL celebrates and promotes this captivating aspect of the Norfolk Coast National Landscape every year with the Dark Skies Festival. This initiative is designed to get people of all ages out into the local landscape, experiencing the wonders of the night sky, with the shared goal of raising awareness and protecting the designated Dark Skies zones and nocturnal species that thrive in these areas, from light pollution.
Due to our familiarity with the NCPL brand identity and visual language, we were brought on board to design and produce engaging pull-up banners for use at promotional events and to design a graphic ‘star map’ displaying the constellations visible in different orientations of the sky.
The Star Maps were produced as A5 info cards and designed to be interactive, inviting visitors to step outside at night and look up. That meant thinking carefully about who picks this up and what they need from it. It needed to work for the curious first-timer who can't tell Sirius from Regulus, and not feel patronising to experienced astronomers.
We mapped the autumn constellations visible in the skies over Norfolk, oriented geographically so the map relates directly to the horizon you'd be standing in front of. Key stars, constellations and the orientation of the Milky Way are all marked. The design work was really about making that information feel accessible rather than clinical. Star maps can easily tip into either sterile data graphics or retro pastiche. We wanted something that felt genuinely contemporary and inline with the NCPL brand language, while respecting the subject.
We worked with our local print partner Norwich Print Solutions on producing the final prints for both banners and star maps. Getting print decisions right when it comes to paper stock, finish, and weight is important as it affects how people relate to a piece.
Projects like this are a reminder of why place-based work matters. The Dark Skies Festival isn't just tourism promotion, it's part of how the Norfolk Coast Partnership makes the case for protecting the landscape. Good design here isn't decoration; it's a way of communicating that something is worth paying attention to. We're glad to play a small part in that.