Glasgow-based design firm Curious Oranj is tipped to merge with Glasgow advertising agency Coltas in the next few weeks.
The agency – which created the Curious Group when it merged with architecture practice McConveille Architecture in 2004 – has already moved into Coltas’ offices and is expected to formally announce the deal at the end of next week.
The merger will create an agency which will marry advertising and design, architectural design and digital media design.
Curious Oranj was set up in 1995, named after The Fall song, although it’s not known whether the merger will involve a name change. Coltas was set up at a similar time – in 1993.
Both agencies have diversified to cope with the changing marketplace, handling a wide range of business for their clients.
Coltas, headed by Joe Blake and Lawrence Craig, currently works with a number of high-profile businesses, including Dell, Reid Furniture, Optical Express, Slater Menswear, Radio Clyde and Qube Footwear, while Curious Oranj, run by Stephen Halpin, works with clients that include Diageo, SMG, USC, Pizza Hut and the Scottish Football Association. Coltas sold ItsNotRocketScience, its digital arm, in April 2003.
The two agencies will now work together in Coltas House, based in Glasgow’s city centre, the building purchased and developed by Coltas.
No one at Curious Oranj or Coltas was available to comment on the news as The Drum went to press.