Redesigning the Knowledge Quarter Digital Platform to Power Collaboration

April 11, 2026

The client

The Knowledge Quarter (KQ) is a unique membership organisation bringing together over 100 world-leading institutions across a one-mile radius of King's Cross, Bloomsbury and Euston - from heritage organisations like the British Museum to global innovators like Google. KQ exists to connect people, ideas and institutions to drive collaboration and innovation.

Bravand was appointed as discovery and scoping partner to help KQ rethink how digital could better support that mission - and reduce the operational burden on its small team.

The challenge

KQ's website sat at the heart of its ecosystem but wasn't delivering on its potential. Events, content and member data were spread across multiple tools - Eventbrite, email, spreadsheets - requiring repetitive manual effort from a team of just four or five people. Time that should have been spent enabling collaboration was being absorbed by admin.

The existing member directory, the "Knowledge Bank", was difficult to use and failed to deliver meaningful connections between members. And the website itself acted more like a signposting tool than a destination - users often left quickly rather than engaging with the community or its content. For an organisation of KQ's ambition and stature, that was a significant missed opportunity.

Our approach

We began with a discovery and scoping phase, working closely with KQ staff, member organisations, prospective members, researchers, students and the wider public to understand what each group needed from the platform.

Through workshops, interviews and analysis, we mapped user groups, journeys and goals; audited existing content, systems and workflows; identified pain points and inefficiencies; and defined what success looked like - both operationally and strategically.

Several things became clear. KQ's true value is connection, but its digital tools weren't enabling it. Content was powerful but hard to manage and distribute. The member experience created friction rather than facilitating adoption. And user data wasn't flowing seamlessly across platforms, creating duplication and missed opportunities throughout.

Our solution

We defined a clear roadmap for a new, integrated digital platform built around four priorities.

A fully redesigned WordPress site to act simultaneously as a shop window for KQ's work and members, a content hub for events, news and projects, and an engagement platform for multiple audiences. A reimagined Knowledge Bank - smarter and more intuitive, enabling members to find people by expertise, role or interest and connect directly, without relying on KQ staff to facilitate introductions. Integrated systems connecting Eventbrite, CRM and email platforms to automate data capture, reduce manual duplication and create a single source of truth. And streamlined content workflows making it easier to publish once and distribute everywhere, with space for member-generated content to reduce the burden on KQ's team further.

The full platform was designed to be fully responsive, accessible to WCAG 2.1 AA standard, SEO-optimised and built on scalable architecture to support future growth.

The outcome

This phase focused on discovery and planning - but it laid the foundation for significant transformation: clear opportunities to automate processes and free up team capacity; a platform designed to actively facilitate connections; a website built to showcase KQ's impact and attract new audiences; and a future-ready digital ecosystem to support long-term growth.

"We're excited to be working with Bravand. They've got an interesting model and we get the benefits that working with a collective of freelancers will bring to our project. We were introduced by a mutual connection, which really helped us get over the fear of working with someone we didn't know."
Jodie Eastwood, Chief Executive, Knowledge Quarter