NAO × British High School

nenets autonomous okrug

NAO × British Higher School

Collaboration between BHSAD students and NAO tundra

We like to practice collaborations between educational institutions and real projects we're facing. Students are fond of solving real problems during learning process and many of their ideas and projects are translated into real life lately. This expirience come in handy in our work. As for the clients it is also useful: brings publicity at no cost.

Client: NAO Business Development Center

Work: consulting

2019

How it all started

We visited our friends at British Higher School of Art and Design, who have been contributing on other projects and told them about our NAO philosophy on minimalism we were working on past few years. Angus Colvin, head of design arts department was inspired and couldn't stop dreaming to take students to NAO for them to inspire.

#1 — Micro macro concept

Very thoughtful project on creating immersive museum space using reflexing on likeliness of micro structures you can meet in tundra like jagel and moss, comapered to the surface of the vast wastelands you see from the plane.

This architectural concept was used as the core concept for the expo almost three years later in 2023 and was widely appreciated by the community

Elena Ermolina

NAO CENTER OF BUSINESS AND DEVELOPMENT

Not only the concept looked awesome in micro and macro details, yet the authors also designed the interactive projection of a northern light, that reacts to the movement of the people in front.

#2 — Khadne and the White Reindeer story

There can't be too much legends when you speak about Naryan-Mar. This one story is based on local mythology, following a young girl named Khadne and her white reindeer. In addition to the book, the students developed some nice merch.

That was awesome!

Working with BHSAD is always a wonderful experience, that brings a lot of benefits to all the participants both the client and the students. We liked that we could create two awesome projects for NAO to release and helped students with an inspiring topic.

Students from British Higher School of Art and Design with their master mixed up with awesome guys from NAO

Participation of BHSAD students wasn't unnoticed:

British Higher School of Art and Design has an article on the trip to NAO
Official NAO administration says: students from BHSAD come to help
NAO college writes about guests from BHSAD on their website
NAO24 on the international designer's help

Students had invaluable experience of working with real people and it was very useful for them to visit territory, visit nenets houses, touch materials and feel the texture of the tundra before rethinking it.

Angus Colvin

SENIOR LECTURER & HEAD OF DESIGN CRAFTS BA PROGRAMMES

Elena Ermolina
Producer
Natalia Makovsky
Communication, brand strategist
Angus Colvin
Senior Lecturer & Head of Design Crafts BA Programmes
Asmik Kosakyan
Arina Golovatskaya
Julia Korotkova
Milana Solieva
Maria Leonova
Stepan Pyanykh
and more BHSAD students
Marina Turlay
Lecturer, Critical & Cultural Studies