THE BRAND WITH THE STEALTH BOMBERS.

To communicate through design, this is the story of Off the Radar.

OtR will never be fashion, we don’t follow fashion, we don’t follow trends, this is the OtR way.  Yes the logos are present but it’s always about the stories behind them. I have a story and so do plenty of others.

The brand is about community, a place where the unheard feel heard.  I was told and brought up to think a way that didn’t match up to the rest of the world. My curiosity at the fore front and to question everything that comes my way.

A process that can make you slip into an alien state of mind. It’s in this state,I started to really understand what it meant to be my true self, see everyone wants to be on the Radar…..

But what I’ve found out, is life’s better off it.

“My own mental health issues have helped me understand the power of the mind. Years ago when my depression was at its height I was almost paralysed by my mental state and had no motivation or desire to do anything. My one escape from my personal hell was, as daft as it sounds, Batman films.....I guess it allowed me to escape my reality by entering a less painful fantasy world. Some of the music and imagery from those films inspired me to draw....just scribbling nonsense I started drawing objects which were morphing into something....but I didn’t know what. Nothing was making sense so I grabbed my favourite hat that I’d kept from when I was kid (a bit of a comfort thing) and I pushed myself to get out of the house for a walk. My mind was going crazy, I was having panic attacks just from being outside, I’d been on a sofa for that long. I felt absolutely awful about everything. I was desperately trying to think of ways to overcome this hell I was living and I got so angry with myself that I actually dropped to my knees and the tears started to flow. I cried for ages...... then my imagination went into overdrive.

I just shut my eyes and imagined myself as a pilot in a fighter jet swooping into my mind (a bit like an arcade game), then the silhouette of a jet just morphed in to this stealth bomber.......it’s shape it’s presence gave me goose pimples. I started imagining it flying round my mind firing and dropping bombs on all the emotions and insecurities that were troubling me.......the stealth bomber was fighting back. I visualised all my negative emotions as words and every time I attacked them with the bomber the words got smaller. I got lost in this mad moment but I felt energy and life coming back into my body, my adrenaline was flowing like never before.... it felt amazing. I screamed out I CAN BEAT THIS, YOU WONT STOP ME YOU WON’T. Whilst I was in this euphoria and feeling like I could fly myself, I took my cap off and thought maybe I could make a cap with powers, a reminder of what had just happened. It would remind me how far I’d come and just maybe it could inspire others. On the way back home, as I was trying to think up a name for this cap, I stopped to take a look around at where I was.....I was alone.....I was “OffTheRadar"

 

The circular OTR logo is a story telling creation that represents “a state of mind” the above shows two stealth bombers colliding, symbolising the conflict and destructive nature of mental health issues. Look again... there are two people talking (a crucial part of the process for dealing with any problem), a further glance reveals a butterfly, symbolising the peace of mind. 

Acknowledging and helping those with mental health issues will always be a part of our DNA, after all, it's one of the reasons the brand was born. But this is a story with a wider, uplifting and inspirational goal; to recognise that even in the darkest moments there can and should always be help and hope.