COMMUNITY

We earn our living here in this community and it’s important that we give back in meaningful ways. What better way for a graphic design company to help than to provide our pro-bono services to many of its finest festivals and deserving charitable organizations—those that make our city and country a better place to live. We don’t just do this out of some do-gooder sense of obligation, but simply because it’s truly exciting to work with these committed people and entities. They inspire us, keep us close to those things that matter and, in the end, provide us with great joy.

OrKidstra

OrKidstra is a social development program that empowers children from under-served communities by teaching life skills—such as teamwork, commitment, respect and pride in achievement—through the universal language of music. With the passionate belief in the transformative power of music, OrKidstra started with 27 children in 2007 and now includes more than 700 children, ages 5 to 18, from 62 linguistic and cultural backgrounds. Aero has committed this past year to supporting this incredible organization indefinitely with graphic design services, starting with “Crescendo,” OrKidstra’s strategic planning document, thereby helping in a small way to transform the lives of at-risk Ottawa youth through the power of success through music.

To support OrKidstra, click here

CityFolk

Located at Lansdowne Park in Ottawa, CityFolk (formerly known as the Ottawa Folk Festival) is a multi-day celebration of music, dance and CityFolk community featuring an eclectic mix of musical performances on various stages. CityFolk is family-friendly, community-focused, culturally diverse and committed to eco-friendly initiatives. The festival enhances cultural life and contributes to the economic activity of the local community, the city and the region, and encourages a sense of community in all who participate in shaping the festival, while challenging everyone to uphold the values the festival promotes. Aero provides sponsorship for this worthy community event through comprehensive branding and design services—from stage graphics to annual theme design and collateral.

Revenue from CityFolk helps to support several highly successful community programs for youth, such as Blues in the Schools, Be in the Band, She’s the One, What’s in the Song and the BluesFest School of Music and Art.

To see all the great things CityFolk does for our community, click here

The Gramophone Memorial Tour

Among its many gifts, music gives us the power to remember.

The people of Holland do a better job of commemorating Canada's sacrifices in the Second World War than do Canadians. The Gramophone Memorial Tour project was begun in 2014 by Dutch physician Dr. Jeroen Pinto as a way to commemorate Canadian airmen who paid the supreme sacrifice from 1939 to 1945. Using vintage portable gramophones and 78 RPM recordings of the type played by airmen in messes and barracks in every theatre of the war, videos are recorded in both Canada and Europe at the bases where these men trained and operated from, pubs they frequented, their family homes, the places they died or the graveyards and memorials where they now rest.

Aero has created the brand for the Gramophone Memorial Tour and is a dedicated participant in gramophone commemorations throughout Eastern and Southern Ontario

There are six gramophones that are used in the tour, three of which are in Canada—known as Vera, Amy and Amelia. Both Amy and Amelia are used by Dave O'Malley and colleagues to commemorate Canadian airmen, soldiers and sailors by playing hit songs from the war (“Apple Blossom Time,” “We'll Meet Again,” “Don't Sit Under the Apple Tree” and “Lilli Marlene”) at commemoration sites, recording them and uploading them to the Gramophone Project Facebook Page.

The Gramophone Project inspired O'Malley to find the names, stories and photographs of all 472 men from the Glebe and surrounding neighbourhoods or those who attended Glebe High School and map the addresses of their family or matrimonial homes. The goal, set for 2020—the 75th anniversary of the end of the Second World War—will be to play Amelia at the addresses of all 472 war dead.

The mapping of these men lead to something amazingly creative. Julian Armour, Executive and Artistic Director of the Ottawa Chamber Fest and Music and Beyond was shown the map, and in its streets and avenues and dots, he saw music. Extracting the essence of these patterns, Armour commissioned composer Gilled Leclerc to create a piece of music. The result, called “Glebe North—Leaving Home,” is a powerful and emotional musical commemoration of the loss of so many of Ottawa's best young men. This piece will also be played alongside Amelia at each address of the Gramophone Project's Glebe Sacrifice.

To hear Gilles Leclerc’s “Glebe North—Leaving Home,” click here.

TELUS Ride For Dad

The mission of the TELUS Ride For Dad is to raise funds to save men’s lives by supporting prostate cancer research and raising public awareness of the disease. The Ride raises funds ($33 million to date!) through large-scale, one-day motorcycle, snowmobile, watercraft and ATV ride events and through ongoing public fundraising throughout the year.

TELUS Ride For Dad events take place in multiple cities from coast to coast all across Canada. Aero has been supporting the Ride as a branding and design sponsor since 2001. In addition, Dave O’Malley sits on the Ride For Dad Board of Directors as well as the board of the Prostate Cancer Fight Foundation, the organization that oversees the research proposals and dispenses funds raised in each community back to research or awareness projects in those communities.

To support the Ride For Dad, click here. 

Bluesfest

Ottawa’s RBC Bluesfest is an annual outdoor music festival that takes place each July in downtown Ottawa. While the festival’s lineup historically focused on blues music at its inception, it has increasingly showcased mainstream pop, hip hop, reggae and rock acts in recent years. RBC Bluesfest has become the largest blues festival in Canada and the second largest in North America. Bluesfest is more than just a music event, it is an iconic top-tier festival event that has become part of the social fabric of the city.

Bluesfest is a force of gravity, pulling music-lovers from Rockland to Pembroke, from Wakefield to the St. Lawrence River—The Daisy Dukes, the Lawn Chair People, the old Hippies, the seniors, the children, the Rednecks, the Hip-Hoppers, the Bellowing Boys, the snap-collared polo people, the Instagrammers and Facebookers, the shoulder-riding teenage girls, the braided-beard-leather-cowboy-hat-wearing folk, the Bass Pro Shop boys, the entitled, the working women and men, the first-timers and the 25-year veterans.

As a sponsor for the past 24 years, Aero provides graphic design support from thematic design, stage scrims and signage to commemorative posters, festival credentials, car wraps and much more

To see all the great things RBC Bluesfest does for our community, click here

Festival of Small Halls

Big Music in a Little Place—that tag line pretty well sums it up for this unique grassroots festival. The Ontario Festival of Small Halls (FOSH) is about sharing the love of music in the heart of small-town communities. The festival produces over 30 concerts in rural community halls across Eastern Ontario for 12 days in September.

FOSH celebrates and strengthens small town culture and community life in places that would not otherwise see nationally acclaimed music artists. The festival engages a host organization—members of the community—to promote and run each single-day performance and to co-ordinate complementary events such as community suppers, BBQs and wine-tastings.

Aero provides everything from branding, posters and programs to social media advertising.

To volunteer or attend a FOSH event in your community, click here.

Vintage Wings of Canada

Since 2004, Aerographics has provided thousands of hours of pro-bono graphic design, research and writing services to the Vintage Wings of Canada Foundation, a charitable foundation supporting the Michael U. Potter Collection of Historic Aircraft. From branding to website content to program creation, Aero supports this unique and world-class Canadian institution with powerful imagery and messaging. Our mission is to help to tell the stories of the great Canadian aviation heroes of the Second World War, whose stories can inspire a new generation and teach them values that are no longer in fashion—Duty, Honour and Sacrifice.

To volunteer at Vintage Wings of Canada, call 819-669-9603

Webster Memorial Trophy Competition

For a decade, Aero has been supplying support in the form of a recruitment poster to the annual Webster Memorial Trophy Competition, which is committed to identifying Canada’s top amateur pilot. The competition has operated since its inception in1932, interrupted only by the Second World War.

The competition is named after John Webster Jr., a civilian pilot who participated in the 1931 Trans-Canada Air Pageant. In July 1931, John flew his Curtiss-Reid Rambler representing Canada in the King’s Cup Air Race in England. A month later, while in St. Hubert, Québec practising for an aerobatic competition as part of the pageant, John Webster was involved in a fatal aircraft accident. The following year, John’s father (Dr. John C. Webster of Shediac, NB) established the John C. Webster Memorial Trophy Competition to perpetuate his son’s memory.

COPA’s Montebello Winter Ski-Plane Fly-In

The word community encompasses more than just neighbourhoods and the cities that surround them. It also speaks of social structures and common interests. Aero is a dedicated sponsor for organizations and events within the aviation community, including many air shows and fly-ins across the country.

The signature winter flying event for the International Challenger Owners Association (1990–2018) and now the Canadian Owners and Pilots Association (2019+) is the spectacular ski-plane fly-in on the frozen Ottawa River at the magnificent Fairmont Chateau Montebello—the world’s largest log structure. Since 2006, Aero has supported the event by providing a commemorative poster.