With the discovery of the timbers from the HMS Namur hidden beneath the Chatham Dockyard floors, and supported by National Lottery funding, The Historic Dockyard Chatham (THDC) opened the new Command of the Ocean exhibition – an exhibition looking at the Age of Sail and its importance in Britain’s history.

Previous to the Command of the Oceans pitch, we were working with THDC to design and develop their new website. In doing so, we had gained a wealth of knowledge about the Age of Sail and the history of the Dockyard.

This advertising campaign looks at the significance of the innovation, craftsmanship and tradition that took place at the Dockyard and what it did for our history as a nation over 250 years, during the Age of Sail; a predominantly unstudied and unfavoured period of time.

Using large paintings from the era, courtesy of the National Maritime Museum, paired with typography, we used the headline to highlight the epic and unfathomable craftsmanship of the scene and anchored it against where the subject of the painting was made – the Dockyard. These were to be placed along the routes into Chatham from London and the surrounding towns.

The campaign showcased these grand, oak ships; these dogs of war, in all their glory, through engineering and innovation at the Dockyard. Setting these beautiful paintings amongst normal day to day life, as an interruption, created an outdoor art gallery, to evoke thought and emotion about the era, the struggles and the glories of war at sea, and how Britain came to rule the waves for over 250 years.