Beyond the Surface had undertaken projects for various departments of the Royal Academy of Engineering since November 2023, including a pitch deck and a multipurpose PowerPoint template. That’s why the Academy came to us for a refresh of its annual report. The report had looked the same for a few years now, and its appearance no longer represented the Academy’s branding and mission.
The annual report is often the first document people see when they look for information about the Academy. It’s also sent to each of the fellows, and used by the development team. As such, it was important that the form of the report should be as innovative and exciting as the content. Working closely with the in-house team, we created a bold and punchy report template that really showcased the impact of the Academy’s work.
Client
Team
Francesca Romano
Visual Identity, MS Office design
“Our annual report had been looking much the same for the past few years and we were looking for a refresh. One of the Academy’s aims is to change the perception of engineering and show it as diverse and exciting, and we needed the annual report to reflect that, as a core piece of our communication. We worked with Francesca before on some PowerPoint-based projects, and we liked how she had interpreted the brand, so we wanted the same for the annual report.
The new annual report is showing the brand in a fresh perspective; the colour is really shining and the text is very clear and legible, which had been a concern in the past. Francesca is very organised and always keeps track of the schedules, which I really appreciated. We had many small rounds of changes towards the end of the project, but she was patient throughout. This helped us with a process we didn’t have much control over.”
Gemma Hummerston, Senior Editorial and Brand Manager
The new look
Compared to previous years, the report needed to look much less conservative and “safe”. We used the existing brand and found new ways to heighten its impact; for example, by exploring contrast and white space.
Two options were developed for the refreshed look and feel, so that the Academy could choose the one that aligned best with its goals and processes. Each one could be published in a different way for online visualisation. Once the team made a choice, the winning option was used to produce the full report.
Production phase
Once the Academy’s team had approved the content, it was laid out in the report. We made suggestions about using layouts strategically to make the report more engaging and impactful – for example, picking out data points from the text to highlight, and keeping the page count down to make printing easier.
Print and online
The final product was delivered in two PDFs. One was optimised for online visualisation, and the other was sent to print for a limited run. These copies were sent directly to the members of the Academy, who include business leaders in the field of engineering and startups working with the latest technologies, like AI and quantum computing.
