James Cropper: What colour is…Manchester?

James Cropper asked us to strengthen its position as the leading colour papermaker in the UK and find a more meaningful way to connect with leading creatives. Able to colour match and create bespoke colours for paper and packaging, we developed a campaign built around the connection between colour, creativity and location.

This became the foundation for “What colour is?”, a campaign designed to highlight the importance of colour on our environment and how this shapes our cities, memories, landscapes and shared sense of place. 

Manchester was the start. We interviewed members of the public and asked one simple question: “What colour is Manchester?”

The answers captured personal associations with the city and helped shape a palette inspired by the place itself. A social campaign built up suspense and intrigue, before the responses were displayed at the Independent Paper Show in Manchester. Yellow, red and blue became the core, each linking back to recognisable parts of Manchester; the yellow of the tram network, the red brick buildings, the blue of Beetham Tower.  

This visual thread was carried through and gave James Cropper a campaign that connected social content, public insight, colour storytelling and physical brand experience. The result was a campaign rooted in Manchester, helping James Cropper bring its product range and technical capability to life in a way that felt relevant to the event, true to the brand and memorable for the audience.