Dear Brum
How do you bring Brum to centre stage?
Europe’s largest local authority, Birmingham City Council (BCC), is the local government body responsible for the direction of the City of Birmingham. Well known for their work in health, education and services, BCC carries a rich and colourful history as the backbone of the UK’s second largest city.
In 2022, Birmingham hosted The Commonwealth Games; an event created to bring nations together in a colourful celebration of sport and human performance. In a pursuit to rouse up its audience about the arrival of The Games and the legacy being built, BCC came to the creative minds at HDY Agency to help tell the story. Our story. The Brummie Story.
Selling a record 1.5 million tickets and watched by almost half of the UK population, The 2022 Commonwealth Games was the most popular Commonwealth Games ever to be hosted in the UK. Working with BCC to encapsulate the essence of Birmingham and the emotion people feel for their city, the answer lay within our concrete jungle, in the form of Casey Bailey, poet laureate for Brum.
After reworking Casey’s original piece ‘Dear Brum’, our in-house motion team were able to create a visual love letter using a double exposure technique to increase the appeal and shareability.
We launched the video at Birmingham City Council House following its 18 month hiatus for maximum impact. Using our state of the art AV equipment, we showcased the result to the stakeholders, influencers and councillors of Birmingham. At the end of the ‘Dear Brum’ showing, our swift social team made the film live on all socials. After being picked up, retweeted and shared by Brummies and people outside of the city, the impact was apparent and the results were astounding.
What began as a devotion to Birmingham quickly became a viral piece of video content that secured a Royal Television Society Award in the best promotional content category. To create a symbolic piece of film that’s so rooted at the heart of Birmingham visualising its character, history, present and future was an incredible experience and deep honour from everyone involved in the project and we loved working on ‘Dear Brum’.
It was exciting to see our city have its moment and the entire HDY team were thrilled to be a part of something so iconic in several ways, this being a big one.
