London Weekend Television - Identity

Identity

LWT has always had very distinctive branding, used in an attempt to stand out from the crowd as an ITV company and in a hope to gain advertising revenues. LWT's branding looks changed frequently so as not to appear boring or dull.

LWT's initial on-screen look featured the name London Weekend in white zooming in on a black background accompanied by an electronic jingle. This was replaced the following year by an ident featuring a spinning disc on screen against a grey background with the caption in the centre accompanied by a soundtrack of electric notes. The same ident was retained until later that year when colour was introduced to LWT, in which the ident was modified so grey was replaced by orange.

One of LWT's most recognisable idents was that of the 'River'. Introduced in 1971, the river ident featured a stripe made up of blue, white and red moving across the black background in the shape of an 'L' and a 'W' following on from the bottom of the 'L'. This design is based on the course of the River Thames which has a similar layout in one section. The ident was accompanied by a vibraphone and brass jingle. This ident was parodied by a number of people and was modified in 1978 to represent the new London Weekend brand of LWT. The ident remained the same with a modified version of the same music, but at the end, the river sections snapped down into the stripped LWT logo.

It was this striped logo that was enhanced further as the years progressed. In 1986, computer graphics were used for the first time in presentation as LWT changed their ident. This one featured the individual stripes of the LWT logo animating on by twisting into view against a white textured background, when upon formation, the LWT logo would become embossed in a 3D effect. This version was used on programmes shown across the ITV network. This was accompanied by a version in which each letter, and then the whole logo, animated on with the effect of a venetian blind. This version was only used in London.

In 1989, LWT adopted the first ITV generic look and retained it until 1992, with their three coloured striped featuring in their segment of the ITV logo. It was replaced in 1992 with a large 3D logo forming from the left to a remixed version of the generic music. An ITV logo could also be present at the bottom of the screen.

In 1996, the logo was redesigned on the same concept as before. The letters LWT remained and as did the idea of the stripes, but there were only two stripes instead of three and the colours were arranged one colour per letter, rather than one per stripe. The ident itself started with small particles of the three colours moving through the screen to form the striped LWT logo against a loud and brash soundtrack.

In 1999, LWT was forced to adopt the second ITV generic look, based on the theme of hearts. This time, the idents were bland and boring compared to LWT's normal fast paced presentational package, and as a result LWT was the only company to drop this look in 2000 and replaced it with the theme of a video wall. The ident would start with a pan of the video wall before drawing out to see the LWT logo spinning into place with the ITV logo below it. The theory was good, however the first version had two problems: the colour scheme of primarily red and the soundtrack of electronic bleeps, which caused complaints from the continuity announcers and viewers alike. It was altered in 2001 to include the new ITV1 logo, to reduce the red colour scheme and to introduce a soundtrack that was similar, but had a discernible crescendo.

From October 2002, LWT no longer has any regional branding, with the new ITV London using the generic network idents with name checks used only.