The new look of Melbourne City
Posted July 24th, 2009.
My partner and I have been looking to move to Melbourne for some time now and so I was particularly interested to see my future Cities new image.
The logo was developed by the Australian branch of Landor Associates for just shy of $200,000 and according to CEO Dr Kathy Alexander has the following objectives:
- Consolidation of multiple logos into a single, strong, cutting-edge design
- Better identification of services City of Melbourne is delivering
- Greater brand impact and flexibility
- More cost and time-effective in-house design and brand management
Below are a dozen alternate colour schemes, as well as the final mark which is said to represent the cultural and artistic nature of Melbourne.
The design appears heavily inspired by Melbourne’s Federation Square and while I like the full colour render, I think the message is somewhat lost on the black-only version. Besides that, It’s a great improvement over the old logo.
The “leaf” logo has been in use now for 15 years and was found to be outdated, weak when compared to other national and international city brands and with a score of additional logos leads a somewhat fragmented image.
As a result, Melbourne’s annual design costs are said to be nearly $100,000 and their new unified brand images is set to negate this. Last but not least, is some printed collateral to accompany their new brand image.
What do you think?
As with any large re-brand their is going to be a lot of love / hate going around, but at the least it’s a big improvement in my book.
Hi there, simply wanted to say thanks a lot for this post. It let me recognize something I hadn’t given a lot of attention to it before hand.
Paul,
No problem. You’re a Melbournite too I see, it’s a big improvement for our home town.