Bristol creative business, Blue Flint Group, has re-branded under a new name – Istoria Group – and has commissioned world-renowned, Bristol-based documentary photographer Martin Parr to photograph its seven-strong board, in celebration of the re-launch.
The strategic business re-brand has been undertaken to ensure that Istoria Group – already a multi-million pound business and a highly successful, independently-owned collective of five creative and innovation companies, including exhibition, events and experiences company Ignition; interiors and branding agency Phoenix Wharf; strategic communications agency Caroline; children’s book publishers, I am a Bookworm, and pioneering innovation platform Solverboard – is ready for the next ambitious stage of its growth at a regional, national and international level.
“We can now offer clients access to a raft of specialist talent, based in asingle, collaborative office”, Sam Rowe explains. “Our point of difference is that we have shared processes and systems throughout the group, so that clients can decide if they want to work with a single specialist agency – on a shop, restaurant, re-brand, event or exhibition, for example – or else liaise across the group via a single point of contact for all of their creative and design needs.”
The business favours a direct and honest way of working with a highly personable approach and the commission of Martin Parris a perfect embodiment of this. “We’re great fans of Martin Parr’s portraiture and of the frank and wryly humourous edge he brings to his work”, Sam Rowe, CEO of Istoria Group comments, adding that “The commission also reflects our belief in Bristol as a centre of world-class creative talent”.
Istoria Group, which is based in Bristol’s Paintworks, is located only a few hundred metres from The Martin Parr Foundation, which the photographer opened in 2017 to preserve his archive and legacy and to showcase and archive the work of other new and established photographers.
New changes to the Istoria Group Board
Part of the re-brand includes the confirmation of changes for the Group at board level. Former MD Sam Rowe has now become Group CEO, whilst former CEO & Founder Claire Menzies becomes Istoria Group’s new Chairwoman.
