A place apart
At the centre of campus sits Hatley Castle, a natural landmark for orientation on the site. Completed in 1908, this federally designated heritage building served as a naval and military training college from 1940 until the college closed in 1995. Royal Roads University was founded that same year, and the castle has been its administrative centre since. Hatley Castle and its gardens are a major attraction for visitors to Vancouver Island. Consequently, the wayfinding system needed to support Royal Roads as both a public destination and an academic institution.
Audit and analysis
Disconnected signage and varied site conditions called for an informed design approach. Cygnus audited every interior and exterior sign on campus, documenting each one against site and building plans. Separate pedestrian and vehicle analyses traced the routes people take from each arrival point to each destination, step by step. The audit found inconsistent naming and messaging across signage, the website, and orientation materials, and identified where information was missing, weathered, or wrongly scaled. These findings grounded the wayfinding strategy in operational needs and set the priority for sign types, placements, and messaging across the campus.
Co-designed with the campus community
Staff, faculty, and students helped shape the system through interactive workshops. Exercises included memory mapping, empathy matrices, and site evaluations to uncover how users experience the campus and where wayfinding breaks down. Staff identified key landmarks and circulation gaps, while local and international students raised concerns about parking, building naming, and navigation. Consistent naming became a priority of its own, carried across signage, the campus map, and orientation materials.
Wayfinding master plan
Findings from the audits, analyses, and engagement sessions shaped a wayfinding master plan that defines key arrival points, organizes pedestrian and vehicle flow, and identifies the locations where people make decisions. Information becomes more specific as people move closer to a destination, so each location carries only what is needed at that point. These locations matter on a campus where mature tree cover obscures sightlines to buildings, and one-way roads offer no easy way back if turns are missed.
Vehicle circulation analysis
First time student drop-off
Signage standards
A flexible family of signs, from permanent building identification to temporary event signage, supports a consistent experience through special events, construction, and expansion to new campus locations. Keeping that consistency over time depends on clear ownership. Implementation guidelines assign responsibility for governance and set procedures for adding, changing, and maintaining signs.
Brand visibility
Inconsistent application and aging signs had diluted Royal Roads’ visual identity across campus. The updated program aligns with current brand guidelines and creates a timeless system even as visual styles evolve. A limited colour palette, drawn from the brand identity, ensures consistency across the signage family and reinforces a unified look. To support placemaking, a secondary RRU mark was developed for use in high-impact zones, such as campus entrances and major wayfinding elements. For interior applications, the logo was abstracted into a mosaic pattern, activating shared spaces and creating a consistent branded experience.
Campus maps
Navigating Royal Roads’ expansive and varied landscape requires clear and accessible orientation tools. A custom campus map was developed to reflect the natural terrain, roadways, buildings, and amenities, with travel times and distances to help users plan efficient routes.
To make the large site easier to understand, the campus is divided into five coloured zones: Upper, Central, West, East, and Lower. The names build on the informal use of “West Campus” and follow a consistent directional system, with Hatley Castle in the Central zone. Accessible parking and pathways are clearly marked to support users with mobility challenges. A tailored suite of pictograms reinforces key messages across signage, designed to be easily understood and relevant to the campus environment. Together, these tools enhance wayfinding while promoting safety and inclusivity for all visitors.
John Horgan Campus
In 2025, the John Horgan Campus opened in Langford, BC. It is a shared campus between Royal Roads, the University of Victoria, Camosun College, the Justice Institute of BC, and the Sooke School District. The signage standards developed for the Colwood campus were adapted for the new environment, including an updated colour palette to reflect the five institutions and scaling the exterior signs to suit a dense urban area with different bylaws. The result is a signage system that integrates with the architecture and interior design of the campus while retaining consistency with the overall standards.
Inclusive campus
The John Horgan Campus is designed to be a safe, inclusive, and welcoming place for students and visitors. The signage program supports this by showing people that the campus was made with them in mind. Gender-neutral washrooms with private stalls are marked with a universal toilet icon instead of male and female figures, so the signs don't reinforce a gender binary. The Connection Desk sign is large and can be seen from the first floor, so visitors and new students can easily find help. Across the campus, signage helps people understand what is available to them and leaves them feeling acknowledged, safe, and that they belong.
