Just north of the studio is Shoreditch Trust. The Trust tackles issues of housing, education and well-being, often using culturally-led projects to stimulate community action. One of the concerns in designing for this kind of all-encompassing project, is the problem of representation. Government guidelines are riddled with politically correct regulations on the percentages of ethnic groups that can be shown in any given image. So, how to sidestep these regulations on representing local social diversities?

Pigeons.

They are the other great urban population. They travel great distances, but always like to come home in the end. They live in communities and in neighbourhoods. They suffer and they prosper. They procreate, relentlessly. They die. They are at once ridiculous and beautiful. Hard working and lazy, they preen, pose and fight — availing of local amenities. Comic, serious, dirty and fine feathered. They talk, chatter, sing and coo — they never shut up!

They are … just like us.

Our pigeons were immediately taken to the hearts of Shoreditch locals, and now they appear across all of the Trust’s visual strategy.