Framing LDF by Pentagram
"I’ve always believed LDF is an unrivalled platform. It is a showcase for a variety of ideas and design directions, and we need an idea ourselves that will work with our partners and not overshadow them and their voices."
Continuing a creative partnership that spans more than a decade, Pentagram has developed a new graphic identity for London Design Festival 2026 built around the theme Framing LDF.
This year’s identity explores London Design Festival as a platform that champions the UK design industry and amplifies hundreds of creative voices across the city. For 2026, Pentagram looked towards the role the Festival plays within the city itself – from supporting emerging creatives in their early careers to providing established practices and designers with a platform to showcase new ideas and ambitious projects. Across exhibitions, installations, institutions and design districts, LDF acts as a stage for design stories to unfold.
The resulting identity reflects this. A neutral typographic foundation is paired with a framing device that can shift, animate and adapt across formats, spotlighting partner’s imagery and their creative activations. Operating like a window into the Festival, the frame becomes both a graphic and symbolic tool for the way LDF connects audiences with design happenings across London.
To coincide with the launch of Framing LDF, we spoke with Pentagram Partner Domenic Lippa about the ideas that shaped this year’s identity and how it captures the spirit and intent of the Festival.
What inspired Framing LDF? Were there any key themes that this year's identity responds to?
DL: Although our process every year is the same, we take great efforts to reinvent the campaign for the Festival by trying to look at each year through a fresh lens. We understand very clearly the need for the Festival to shine a light onto many design sectors and disciplines. Therefore, we constantly look for a design that will allow us this flexibility. By employing a ‘framing device’ we can highlight many different details of any of our partner’s work.
This year's identity marks a departure from previous, bolder typographic campaigns. What informed this shift in direction?
DL: My team and I believe that the Festival like the use of typography because it’s a neutral thread for LDF to use without conflicting with the different design directions of our partners. This neutrality is vital to give us our independence and visibility. London is a visually loud and complex city which we need to cut through. The red is our most important asset along with our core identity. Our last couple of campaigns have been very distinctive. This year we wanted something which is still confident yet has a sophistication. Something cool. Although the typography is relatively simple the invisible frame gives the concept an ever-evolving digital function that can work over any image and even without imagery. We found this an interesting change for the Festival.
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With communications increasingly needing to exist across digital, motion and physical formats, how important was flexibility in shaping this year's identity?
DL: In some ways our campaign ideas 10-15 years ago needed to have more flexibility as we were doing as much print related applications as we were digital. Over the years the pendulum has swung to being mainly digital. But we still need ideas that can and will work on a printed application. So, flexibility has always existed. I hope each year we have large or small surprises that engage people. That reflect the notion that we and everyone at the Festival really care about this opportunity. The Festival is part of the design team, and I always value their input. It makes the whole process more rewarding.
Pentagram has designed the Festival's identity since 2007. How do you balance recognisability with reinvention year after year?
DL: We have certain assets that give us our recognisability, our colour red and our masterbrand are the core for everything. You can glimpse a slice of red and I believe that people connect to the Festival. We then counter this with the attitude of each year’s campaign direction. It’s a simple balancing act. If one dominates the other, then we’ve failed. We never take for granted this project or the client. We’re not complacent. We have a huge responsibility and myself and my whole team work hard to keep things moving.
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