Friday, 13 May 2016

OUGD505 / STUDIO BRIEF 02 / REDS

I researched into a very meat based restaurant, Red's, to see the language and design choices surrounding an establishment catered heavily towards meat eaters. I wanted to determine what to avoid and what to learn from, whether I can apply any methods to a vegan restaurant.





















The dominant colour is red, a colour heavily associated with meat, excitement and hunger. The typeface used is a slab serif, characterised by thick block serifs, it is angular, forceful and connotes volume, even masculinity because of the nature of the colours featured on the website. Meat is associated with 'manliness', due to the caveman argument that we have been eating meat and killing our prey since the dawn of time.

The most interesting part of Red's branding is the language surrounding it. They seem to have brought in religious connotations, similar to some of Mcdonald's advertisements, that eating meat is 'holy' and something to celebrate. This is achieved through the utilisation of a lexical field of religion, examples such as the exclamatory sentence "praise be" and "#lettherebemeat" are all religious phrases featured in the christian Bible. This communicates the ideology that meat is a 'holy' experience, especially Red's meat.

They also refer to themselves as Churches, e.g "book at your place of worship" and through the ability to select your local Red's restaurant, which is a dropdown menu stating "select your church".






































"Join our Flock" is an imperative sentence relating back to animals and a group. It gives the user a sense of inclusivity.

Aside from language, Red's have also created the shape of a cross through cutlery, again referring to meat in a religious way. 

Analysis:

What I concluded from this research is that Red's do an excellent, if not slightly weird job of drawing in a consumer through making them feel part of a movement/group. They portray meat as something great to be part of, which I will try to channel through my own work but regarding plants. I need to demonstrate, like Red's have, that being part of the plant based community is enjoyable and fun, and delicious for the consumer.

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