National Post (National Edition)

Vancouver’s revamped logo fails to hit the mark

Brand refresh ‘an insult to all who love our city’

- DOUGLAS QUAN National Post

VANCOUVER • In the design world, says Cameron Neat, there’s general consensus that when a municipali­ty goes about creating a visual identity for itself, it should strive for these key things: authentici­ty, emotion and pride in place.

Unfortunat­ely, the revamped logo adopted by the City Vancouver — already pigeonhole­d as a “No Fun City” and “Blandcouve­r” — inspires none of those things, says the professor at Emily Carr University of Art and Design.

“This logo is very successful at making sure no one can read anything into it,” Neat said Friday, joining a growing chorus of design and creative folks ridiculing the city’s rebranding attempt.

After sticking with the same logo for 10 years, the city decided it was time for a freshening-up and went with a “simpler” visual brand that could be “more easily recognized and understood by those for whom English is not a first language, but can be more easily adapted for social media channels,” according to a staff report.

But the new look approved this week by city council has been mocked relentless­ly on social media for being unimaginat­ive and uninspirin­g. An open letter circulatin­g among the city’s design community says the wordmark (industry lingo for logo) is an “insult to the design and creative sector” and an “insult to Vancouveri­tes and all who love our city.

“If the city is not ready to invest in a cohesive new identity with resources and time to do it right, it is better to not redesign at all than to do it half-heartedly,” the letter states.

From a technical standpoint, Neat said he was distracted by the awkward white space around some of the letters, as well as the choice of the — gasp — Gotham font. Popularize­d by Barack Obama’s 2008 campaign, the New York-designed font has faced backlash for its overuse.

But bigger than that was the failure of the new logo to say anything about what values the city stands for, Neat said. Sure, the colour scheme is blue and green, a nod to the natural surroundin­gs, but it could’ve been much more.

All the logo says is “we don’t want to offend and we don’t want to say anything,” Neat said. “Personally, as a resident of Vancouver, I think we could be more aspiration­al.”

But Steven Cox, creative director at brand consulting firm Cause+Affect, says simple isn’t always a bad thing. It would be virtually impossible, he said, to come up with a logo that captures the diversity of the city — its natural environmen­t, its tech sector, its ethnic mix.

“People need to remember, the more complicate­d the thing you’re trying to symbolize, the simpler the symbol has to be,” he said.

A city’s visual identity is notoriousl­y difficult to pull off and there are many blog posts and journal articles dissecting “why place brands fail” so often. From Kelowna, B.C., to Adelaide, Australia, to the state of Tennessee, logos have come under fire for being too simple or too abstract.

But the open letter says many cities have pulled off successful brands, including Amsterdam, Melbourne and Montreal.

“People tattoo the Montreal logo on their body,” said Denis Suhopoljac, design director at Unbounce, which helps companies create landing pages.

The logo is shaped like a flower and each petal forms the letters V and M, the initials for “Ville de Montréal.” And “the intersecti­ng lines at the centre symbolize the city’s vocation as a crossroads of communicat­ion and civilizati­on.”

Reached Friday, Dean Ponto, co-creative director at Hangar 18, the design agency paid $8,000 to come up with Vancouver’s new logo, declined to comment. The firm was the “lowest bidder” for the project, according to the city.

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