Once again I had the pleasure of working with the brilliant team at Armada Events to bring an epic two night and three day kitesurfing and music festival to Hayling Island. Working closely with Dan Charlish, Director of Armada Events, my job was overseer of the look of the festival, the environmental design within the site, and all of the printed and online design that goes with a project of this scale.

The design I went for this year was all about that glorious warm sunset glow you get from being on a beach and in the water in the later part of the day. I shot the original photography for the poster myself and I gave it several different treatments and layers, all about sunshine, light leaks and sun spots to give it that extra level of richness and depth. Along with the poster, which came first, and then was used to inform the design for the whole event, came the brochure, which although was quite a simple A5 affair, there were tricky elements to it such as the kitesurfing schedule page and the intricate centrefold site and beach map page which holds all of the logos of the the sponsors and brands that take part in the event. Also, I designed the town posters and billboards, the beach flags, stage banners and the welcome banners, which are the first things you’ll see when driving up to the festival. Online, there was a social campaign leading up to the event too.

This year, 8,000 kitesurfers from all over the world attended the event, as well as local festival goers and general public, as the organisers saw it grow bigger than ever before. As always it was a hugely successful and enjoyable weekend, so much so that Armada Events were able to secure investment and support to take the festival even further for future years to come.