Unafraid to flip the script

Being fearlessly bold is the third distinctive characteristic that defines the Wolff Olins mindset.

We’ve always been committed to ideas that challenge the norm. And it makes sense. Wolff Olins was born in the Sixties: a decade when people were questioning everything, from politics to pop culture. The era of student protests, iconic fashion and moon landings. And that spirit of disruption and re-invention set the tone for how we approach brands. 

It also helps that we’ve always attracted big personalities with big ideas, unafraid to shake things up or ruffle a few feathers.

Rule-breaking isn’t a nostalgic whim though. It’s the whole point. No-one builds a brand that stands out by following the rules designed to make them fit in. 

An early case to prove this point is Bovis.

In the 1970s, Bovis Homes was booming but it looked just like any other builder. 

Led by Michael Wolff, we set out to show what made it different. Out went the industry clichés of bulls and bulldozers and in came a hummingbird. Nimble, precise and fast-moving - the antithesis of a lumbering construction giant. It signalled a business built on precision, not brute force, and transformed how people saw the company.

Bovis was an instant hit.

But we know from experience that breaking the rules can come with some controversy.

Yes, London 2012. 

When this brief landed, we could’ve gone with the expected national symbols and dominant Olympic rings. Instead, we flipped the script and opted for something with edge and energy. An unapologetic design that reflected the spirit of London itself and delivered on the ambition to make the Games belong to “everyone”. 

The symbol was debated, questioned, even mocked (The Daily Mail took deep personal offence). Everyone had an opinion. But it worked. It did exactly what it needed to do. London 2012 went on to raise over £1 billion in sponsorship - the highest in Olympic history at the time - and set the stage for an Olympic and Paralympic Games like never before.

Looking back, Global CEO Sairah Ashman explains: “You can’t expect everyone to love what you’re doing, and we didn’t expect them to. But we did want people to notice. This would be a Games like never before, and it needed a brand to match that energy and ambition.”

This same spirit of boldness fuelled our launch in New York in 2001.

By then, the agency scene was as crowded as Times Square. Karl Heiselman, who led our New York studio for several years before leading globally, recalls, “We had to do something big and different to even get people’s attention…we wanted to build a reputation with edge and go beyond the ordinary. We wanted to change the game for our clients, and for ourselves too.”

This ambition to flip the script might sound like it belongs to consumer brands. But often it’s in the B2B world - where convention runs deepest - that it’s most powerful. 

One of our first New York clients was GE, the biggest company in the world at the time. Dry language, corporate clichés, and functional messaging simply didn’t do justice to the company or its people. So we brought in something rarely seen in industrial boardrooms: imagination. 

A big idea that helped GE not just stand out but stand for something, and gave its teams permission to think bigger. 

In today’s data-optimised world, the courage to think differently is more urgent than ever.

We’re living through what we call the “Great Flattening” - where everything’s streamlined for efficiency, not effectiveness. Research rewards consensus. AI predicts the predictable. Everything is becoming faster, smarter…and blander.

To build something genuinely different, we need to remember to trust our gut and be fearless about it. 

Data helps manage risk and gets us to a good starting point, but it takes a creative leap to get somewhere new.

Boldness alone doesn’t define us though.

It’s one part of the mindset that has guided Wolff Olins for sixty years: a blend of ambition for the work, optimism for the world and a fearlessness to flip the script.

This mindset is the blueprint that makes us who we are, and it’s what we bring to every client, every challenge, every brief. Because it works.

It’s what keeps us ambitious enough to tackle the hardest challenges and bring out the best in our clients. Optimistic enough to stay curious and spot opportunity in a dead end. And bold enough to break the rules when the rules no longer work. 

It’s how, on our best days, we land on the ideas that challenge, provoke, get noticed and get results. To be the ones that move the world forward - and make it a little better in the process.

So, thanks 1965 for the blueprint.
Here’s to the next sixty years.
Still ambitious. Still optimistic. Still shaking things up.