Amber Nights is an Irish collective of DJs represented by PolyAmber Records who set out to host club nights and DJ sets in night clubs and bars across the country. With the closing down of night clubs across the country, DJs find it harder nowadays to find opportunities where they can play in a club, so a key objective of the group is to provide up-and-coming talent with live performance opportunities.
In early 2024, I was approached by John Nolan, the leader of the Amer Nights collective to assist him in creating a recognisable brand for the group and providing them with a website where they can highlight talent and promote upcoming events.
Brand Development
Starting off with a logo, initial concepts heaily leveraged the use of typography as per John’s original instruction, and later involved a blend of graphics and typography. Multiple iterations later, we arrived at a design that was more derivative of the PolyAmber brand with colour being the only component that survived from the initial set of designs
The final logo design was inspired by 90s tech company logos and consisted of a hexagonal representation of the letters, “A” and “N” to represent Amber Nights, complemented by the brand name in a standard Arial font. Lastly, the crossbar on the letter A was dissected on both sides to give the type a signature look.
Once the logo was signed off, we proceeded with the development of the website where the brand identity was further expanded.
The Website
Amber-nights is a simple but modern, online platform designed to showcase the unique ambiance, events, and experiences of the Amber Nights brand, along with the nightlife and lifestyle concept.
Built with user experience at its core, the website blends striking visuals, smooth navigation, and engaging content to capture the essence of the Amber Nights atmosphere and bring it to life online. The responsive layout ensures the site looks and feels premium on both desktop and mobile devices, adapting seamlessly to various screen sizes.
Core Design & Aesthetic
The design of Amber Nights is intentionally gritty, using dark and noisy imagery to simulate the low-tech charm of by-gone raves. The site uses a dark and "amber-tinted" color palette with hints of analogous yellows and complementary blues to pay homage to the techniques used to create “vibrating visuals” of those seen in psychedelic genres of music from rock in the 1960s to house music in the late-90s to early 2000s.
Adobe Illustrator, Photoshop and After Effects were used to create web-optimized imagery, and looping animations, to create the feeling of motion throughout the site and evoke the feeling of being in a live music Venue.
Key Sections and Features
The homepage immediately welcomes visitors with an atmospheric hero section, featuring a high-quality background video or image that sets the tone for the brand. This is paired with a succinct group mission statement accompanied by two CTAs for visitors to either sign up for the mailing list or enquire about talent bookings.
The Collective page features profiles for each member of the collective where you can find a bio, contact details, links to streaming services like Soundcloud and Mixcloud, and upcoming gig details for each respective member. The section currently features six members with scope for more additions in the future.
In this page you can find listings for all past and upcoming gigs for various sizes. For those that require tickets, users can access respective ticket vendors from the page and free gigs are listed as such.
To bring the use of personal email address to an end, a contact page was set up to capture messages and queries which are sent to a namesake email address for more professional looking communications.
User Experience & Performance
Special attention was given to fast load times, smooth scrolling, and optimised images to maintain high performance without sacrificing visual quality. The site employs SEO best practices, ensuring visibility to new audiences. Security measures, including SSL encryption, ensure that user data remains safe, particularly during event registration or contact form submissions.
In Summary
Amber Nights was one of the most fun projects I worked in in a long time. It turned out to an all-encapsulating nightlife brand, designed to captivate visitors, showcase events, and foster a connected community around a shared love of music, luxury, and unforgettable nights.