Panóptico de Actualidad Gráfica y Visual
Created by Havas London, the ad sees Buddy the Elf rock up at an Asda store to take part in a trial work shift in the run up to Christmas. Many a slapstick moment follows, as Buddy samples the Christmas food, distracts his colleagues and – of course – sings loudly over the store’s tannoy system. Creating the ad was...
Splashed across packaging or animated on social, food brands’ use of playful, abstract illustration makes a welcome change from glistening ‘food porn’ photography...
It can be hard to find the right term to describe the people who are coming up in the creative industry without it seeming patronising and diminishing. For this issue of the magazine, we’ve settled on ‘new talent’ as the way of grouping the 14 creatives that we’ve profiled within. But this isn’t ideal either, as many of those featured...
It’s been an unseasonably challenging couple of years for Christmas ads, as brands were forced to grapple with how to address the festive season in the wake of the pandemic. This year has brought little respite either, thanks to the rapidly unravelling cost of living crisis. Unsurprisingly, some retailers, such as TK Maxx, have focused on cost-saving in their Christmas...
This year, the pharmacy and beauty store has opted for a ruthlessly upbeat approach to the festive season, with a film starring It’s A Sin actor Lydia West. On an otherwise totally normal bus journey, she discovers a pair of gold-rimmed specs that hide a big secret: they bring out the Christmas spirit in everything and everyone. Once the glasses...
Forget pink dining rooms; digital is the creative frontier for restaurants and food businesses, and according to Hato’s Ken Kirton, there’s plenty of fun to be had...
Last year, M&S brought its Percy Pig mascot to life in animated form for the first time, showcasing him alongside Dawn French who starred as a fairy ornament in the retailer’s Christmas ad campaign. Percy Pig, which was voiced by actor Tom Holland, is nowhere to be seen this time around, however. Fairy is back though, and she’s joined by...
The homelessness charity’s new film sets out to expose the grim reality of the UK’s 119,500 children who’ll wake up on Christmas Day in bleak, temporary accommodation. However that’s not immediately made obvious to viewers. Brave Face opens on Jayden, practicing his best smile in the mirror, and deploying it in response to the day-to-day hardships of school, including no...
When south London-based band Dry Cleaning’s Scratchcard Lanyard video emerged in 2020, it soon became one of the standout songs (and videos) of the whole year; combining deadpan vocal delivery, a teeny tiny disco ball (indeed, a whole teeny tiny disco), lyrics lifted wholesale from Tampax ad slogans, and a surreal-leaning aesthetic that dances beautifully on the line between smart...
Now in its 20th year, Creative Review’s Annual Awards celebrates the best commercial creative work across a wide range of disciplines – advertising, design, digital, music, film and TV, and gaming. Each year we enlist an esteemed panel of judges to examine the entries and determine what’s been the most powerful, innovative, beautiful and effective examples of creativity from the...
Digital apps and products are essential to our lives now – whether it’s how we do banking, socialise, or entertain ourselves. Yet sometimes getting what you want from them can be really hard work. So for this latest edition of Creativity Sucks! – CR’s new podcast series that examines some of the challenges and annoyances of the commercial creative industry...
Launched in 2015, Monzo is heralded for breaking the curse of dry, corporate brands in the personal banking sector. Its uplifting colours, down-to-earth voice and intuitive experience marked a clean break with the traditional banks, winning over a generation of millennials and beyond. A raft of challenger banks joined Monzo’s ranks in the 2010s, and more recently, personal finance brands...
