Burnley is a large market town in the borough of Burnley in Lancashire, England, with a population of around 73,500. It has a 24 lane bowling alley, a 9-screen multiplex cinema and can now boast a new logo as part of a £110,000 re-branding scheme to improve the town’s image. That’s the good news. The bad news (and that’s just my opinion) is the city has chosenthat logo.
Developed by Burnley Vision Board after it secured £300,000 of funding from the North West Development Agency (NWDA), the ‘visual expression’ consists of a computer-generated, three-dimensional image of lots of multi-coloured, tangled circles. That much everyone can agree on. It’s how to interpret the marque where opinions begin to differ.
I’ve seen it described as ‘gutsy’ offering a ‘pretty original interpretation on growth and movement’. Also, as having an ‘amorphous nature’ which lends itself to new media, boldly breaking away from the accepted conventions of static identities. Make your own minds up on that by visiting the website.
Counilor Gordon Birtwistle, leader of Burnley Council, said “Burnley might have been a mess eight or nine years ago, but this shows we’re on the up. It’s bright and unusual and really exciting. I think it’s a brave choice, but I haven’t heard anyone with a bad word to say about it.
Others have been less complimentary, Conservative Councilor Jonathan Gilbert said “The logo is not the best I have seen. Animated it looks like some kind of deformed insect. Is it dynamic? I don’t think so.”
With some suggesting “Burnley looks like a mess”, “it looks like an exploded slinky” or ” the result of a middle manager being let loose on a 3D rendering program.”
Most intriguing/worryingly was Counilor Gordon Birtwistle boast they “had beaten stiff competition from others who had been interested in using the logo.” How is that possible? Was the same logo touted around by some door-to-door identity salesman? If that was the case then surely Burnley’s new identity can have absolutely no relevance to the location?
The Lancashire Telegraph’s poll shows 84% of people who voted ‘hate’ the new logo. What do you guys think?
For more information on this rebrand, and others visit the brandtastic Brand New. Which is where we found most of the colourful quotes.
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6th Nov 2009
3:32 pm
I think It the new brand says a lot about Burnley.
It’s crap.
Andy Allen
6th Nov 2009
4:03 pm
It makes me cringe to even live a few miles down the road from Burnley. Doesn’t matter what Burnley Council say it stands for, because nobody can interpret that from the ‘logo’.
Matt West
6th Nov 2009
4:21 pm
A rebrand or brand design isn’t just a logo so before everyone jumps on the ‘hate’ wagon wait and see how it is used in the location. Straight away on the web site with the animation you can see the marks potential for making some vibrant signage or some funky posters.
It’s just a shame the video on the Burnley web site has a different colour background than the web site itself.
J.Allen
6th Nov 2009
4:41 pm
Designing an identity for a City or Town is always going to throw up issues. At his recent talk at the Design Symposium, Michael Wolff described the task akin to \\\’Eating a dinosaur\\\’ which I thought summed it up quite nicely. How do you cram a whole history, the nuances, the people, the architecture into a simple visual statement?
The contrast between the Burnley branding and the recent Liverpool branding is vast with Liverpool being at the opposite end of the scale at \\\’super safe\\\’.
Im holding judgement until I see its application through different media…
Adam Rix
6th Nov 2009
4:47 pm
Branding a city is like attempting to ‘eat a dinosaur’.
Adam Rix
6th Nov 2009
4:53 pm
J.Allen: Great minds…. await moderation alike. So it would seem!
John Instruct
6th Nov 2009
5:20 pm
I agree trying to cram history/naunces/people into a small mark is pretty difficult but then that could be said for most big branding exercises.
Branding a place or destination has always been notoriously difficult because of instant public opinion and cost being a massive factor.
If you are \’super safe\’ it seems you are slated by the design community but Aunty Ethel thinks its snazzy or if your way to out there your accused of wasting tax payers money.
In saying that there is no excuse for lazyness and that\’s what comes across with this brand, I love foundry gridnik but not sure what it has to do with Burnley!
Andy Russell
7th Nov 2009
1:33 pm
Just read this article and found that one of the quotes used is from yours truly!! :0)
The problem with this logo is that, no matter how much ‘corporate rationale’ is thrown at it… it all sounds like bull****
Matt Sidebottom
7th Nov 2009
3:48 pm
The type’s nice, though.
Barry
7th Nov 2009
5:56 pm
all I see in this logo is a tangled disorderly mess, which is ironic because Gordon Birtwistle seemed to describe the rebrand as Burnley on the up from the mess it was in 8 or 9 years ago.
Jo Glover
8th Nov 2009
2:28 pm
I’m from Burnley and as a designer I’m inclined to agree with the comments featured. However after living in the town for 20 years I think it can only be a positive thing that Burnley is even being discussed on my favourite design blog. I am wondering, though whether it’s the fact that we now have a premier league football team and a bit of cash that people have become interested.
geth
8th Nov 2009
5:28 pm
wonder what happens to the logo when it’s scaled right down and black&white
Neil
9th Nov 2009
12:36 pm
And here are the chaps responsible for it.
http://www.thinking-place.co.uk
josh
9th Nov 2009
7:03 pm
looks like the one dot zero font and some kinda generative thing that would be on a DVD. Guess someone saw one of the DVDs and thought it was \"mega hip and super popping fresh\".
…. deary me
Macabus
11th Nov 2009
3:38 pm
the fonts foundry gridnik – and its completely out of place. – awful identity.
Ray Campbell Lupton
11th Nov 2009
4:36 pm
Shockingly bad, meaningless and inappropriate. Its pseudo intellectualised, overpriced work like this that gives everyone in the industry a bad name.
Brian Copeland
12th Nov 2009
2:15 pm
Has anyone considered the client’s influence in all this? The influence of focus groups, and that age old problem of trying appease every stakeholder in a project – especially local government ones. I reckon the designers on this project probably had an absolute nightmare, and this may well have been their least preferred solution. This thread is like reading the outcry at the London 2012 logo two years ago.
Neil
12th Nov 2009
3:51 pm
Brian – by all accounts the logo was pre-designed by the agency concerned and then chosen by the client. I may be wrong but there is a quote knocking about on various sites discussing the logo from a leading councillor who declares – with seemingly much pride – that they had beaten off stiff competition from other companies wanting to use the logo.
Brian Copeland
12th Nov 2009
6:36 pm
I did read that quote and my immediate reaction was he didn’t have a clue what he was saying. I have never, in my life as a designer, met another designer who would design a logo then tout it round the doors like a brush salesman. I took his comment with an entire sack of salt.
For the record I don’t think it’s going to be very easy to implement, it’s overly complicated, and going to polarise public opinion on our industry yet again – whereby they mostly believe we are overpaid and out of touch with public opinion. After the 2012 fiasco everyman and his dog thought graphic design was a waste of public money and that they could do better themselves. This logo, in attempting NOT to please all of the people all of the time, has unfortunately fallen into the trap of being different for the sake of it – and will give fuel to the fires of those that devalue our profession.
That said you have to respect their decision to continue with it – both agency and client – as the solution to the problems in Burnley. A ‘different’ logo will not solve their political and social issues alas.
Ian Morris
13th Nov 2009
2:55 pm
I don’t really like what I see I’m afraid. It doesn’t communicate any aspects of the locations uniqueness or identity. It doesn’t inspire me to visit or initiate developments there. It does looks like an off-the-shelf design solution, maybe something a designer had put together based on aesthetics without thinking about the true requirement of the brief or brand.
The comment above is right though, let’s see what the rest of the design looks like before we jump to opinions. When it is rolled out and applied it might redeem itself.