The capacity of ruthenium polypyridyl complexes as probes for combined confocal luminescence and resonance Raman imaging, enabled by their large Stokes shift, is demonstrated for a novel membrane sensitive Ru(ii) polypyridyl peptide. Confocal luminescence and resonance Raman imaging provides complementary information about the membrane phospholipid regions of the cell and the location of the dye within the cell.