University of California Rebrands with Attitude

by Chris Brown on Tuesday, December 11, 2012


The University of California has relaunched its brand with with a huge change to it’s logo. Watch this launch video to see the quick version.  RSS readers click here for the link.

Although they’ve developed a complete brand style guide, if I needed to develop a licensed product using the brand execution guide, I’d find a lot of choices.  They’ve created a huge brand promise to live up to:

The positioning

Boldly Californian.

UC embodies the ambition of California and ignites the potential of its people.

And I think they have a lot of attributes that may be difficult to contain…

Brand attributes

Visionary.
Experimental.
Optimistic.
Awe-Inspiring.
Essential.
Audacious.
Pioneering.
Proven.

Everything we say and do should embody these traits.

Although it is “different”, I do admire how they launched it. I like how they packaged their templates on their branding page, and provided easy access to their enormous photo library (all copyrighted of course!) I did notice that they didn’t completely throw away their old seal logo in favor of the new C logo. One of their guidelines “Hire the best photography you can afford” is a mantra that many organizations should aspire to but it’s not a phrase that is usually contained in a style guideline.

What are your thoughts about University of California’s branding/rebrand program?

{ 1 comment… read it below or add one }

Web Design December 14, 2012 at 12:54 pm

This logo is looking tremendous in the video and definitely it will be liked by every one.

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