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| 24.09.04 | |
| more Swiss stories? |
Can Swiss public authorities cut the visual
clutter?
Government looks to introduce
single 'corporate' identity - and cut cost.
Swiss public administration, Swissinfo says, is made up of more than 80 different offices and departments. In recent years, just about every one of these had introduced its own logotype and developed a distinctive public face. The result has been a flood of designs, each with its own implementation costs - much to the delight, no doubt, of local branding consultancies and graphic designers.
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Now, however, it is proposed that a single design should be applied across all the different departments, effective January 2005. A 100-page manual, Swissinfo says, has been produced to police the process which - predictably - will involve the replacement of all existing with a white cross shown against a red background. Alongside this, the words Schweizerische Eidgenossenschaft will appear (or its equivalent in one of the country's three other official languages. Up until now, any number of variations of the national flag have been used, Swissinfo says: the weather department, for example, combines the cross with a cloud symbol. Others avoid its use altogether and have opted for designs like those shown above: like the culture department, for example, which opted for a white 'C' on a black background. Out, too, will go linguistic inconsistencies. The confederation's money, for example, will no longer be described as 'swissmint' - not least, according to Swissinfo, to tremove any confusion that reference is being made to a type of sweet. Similarly, the country's topographical agency will no longer be known as 'Swisstopo', the word 'topo' meaning 'mouse' in Italian, which is spoken by a proportion of the country's population. The font chosen to accompany the new graphic is Arial, selected for its plainness and the fact that it is available on all computers (what the authorities failed to take into account in selecting Arial, the newspaper Neue Zuercher Zeitung has pointed out, is that it is in fact a copy of Helvetics - a much finer typeface developed by Max Miedinger, who was himself Swiss). By introducing a single logo - the cost of which, in project terms, has been 280 Swiss Francs, the authorities hope to save a much larger sum. The savings on design were achieved by not using brand consultants, but calling on the services of a Bern art school. However, over the next two years it is hoped to make savings of approximately 25 million francs. The new design, Swissinfor says, is designed to convey quality, balance and
incorruptibility. Supplementary values that the Confederation wants to be associate with
include trust and pride. Whether these goals can be achieved will be shown in January next
year, when the logo starts to appear. |
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