Rialto – Branding

Client: Rialto   Agency: Interbrand, NZ   Brief: Independent film has come a long way in the last 10 years, and so has the Rialto Channel. No longer just the realm of small budget productions and obscure foreign actors, the Rialto channel now features the best hand-picked cinema from around the world, including Oscar-winning films starring A-list celebrities. To reflect its growth and the diversification of its content, the Rialto Channel needed a refresh to expand the appeal of the brand and engage new audiences. Specifically, it needed to shift the perception that it’s exclusively focused on little-known foreign films and recast itself as an entertainment channel that has something for everyone. We were given a tight brief to work with: The name and typeface had to stay the same and the logo had to retain key elements of the brand’s old identity such as the letter “R” and a star. With a strategy in mind to reposition Rialto as a curator of the best film from around the world, we combined the two original graphic elements into a window device that invites the audience to step through and choose from a wide range of content. The window device allows the brand to showcase the diverse range of film on offer and helps position the channel as a “storyteller” that inspires, informs and entertains through high quality documentaries and top-notch independent productions.