Urbanscapes is Malaysia’s longest-running creative arts festival. Since its inception 15 years ago, the aim of Urbanscapes has always been to bring together Malaysian creative communities from the fields of music, the arts, design, and other disciplines.

Since 2014, Commas has stepped up to the PR plate. We begin at the drawing board with the client, often advising on and conceptualising programming that will prove interesting and newsworthy with its audiences. We are a boutique, fast-paced agency, working with a similarly forward-thinking, millennial-armed client; we are very much in line with the Urbanscapes philosophy, and we understand that above all, speed is everything when it comes to pitching to journalists and producing content.

2014 was a year that proved especially significant, as Urbanscapes made the move to The Ranch, Genting Highlands, the furthest the festival has ever been from the city centre. Later, 2016 saw the festival return to its roots in the heart of Kuala Lumpur – decentralising from a single-day, single-venue festival into a hotchpotch of events happening all over the city centre, spread across three weekends. In other words: We commandeered the glorious cityscape, and then we complemented it with some creative shenanigans. In 2017, we celebrated 15 years of Urbanscapes with a city-wide creative arts festival lineup.

As a creative arts festival that is nationally-, regionally- and internationally-attended, the challenge to Urbanscapes has always been its scale: Commas found a way to cut through the noise and to communicate all that Urbanscapes stands for – by sticking to key messages to build a distinct festival brand – effectively and strategically to media partners and press.

Speaking of media partners: in 2016, Commas engineered the media partnership between Urbanscapes and R.AGE. The partnership entailed exclusive media interviews; extensive media coverage, contests and giveaways; as well as a R.AGE takeover of Urbanscapes House at 2 Hang Kasturi for a film screening of ‘The Curse of Serawan’, an award-winning original documentary about a mysterious illness plaguing orang asli children in the jungles of Perak. Meanwhile, our partnership with Nylon Thailand – a partnership which was extended to a trendsetting Thai influencer, Note Panayanggool aka Notep – proved effective with helping Urbanscapes establish a connection with regional audiences through the creation of original content.

In 2017, Commas generated over RM7.2 million in PR value for Urbanscapes between the months of February to June, across broadcast, print, and online channels. Also in 2017, despite  zero spend on advertising and on media buys, Commas secured five media partners for Urbanscapes, i.e. Coconuts, KISS FM Medan, MTV Asia, Spotify, and Time Out Kuala Lumpur.