We ♥ NYC: Milton Glaser’s iconic logo gets a modern makeover
If it ain’t broke, the saying goes, don’t fix it. But New York City has decided otherwise.
As the New York Times first reported, the city is introducing a new branding campaign that will look awfully familiar to anyone who has ever been to the Big Apple. The new logo in question? We ? NYC.
The new symbol harkens back to a watershed moment in New York City history, when the legendary graphic designer Milton Glaser famously sketched the now-iconic ‘I ? NY’ on the back of an envelope while riding in a cab, in 1977. Since then, that sketch has become a trademarked logo, owned by the New York State Department of Economic Development. It has appeared in myriad souvenir shops and raked in millions of dollars through associated licensing agreements.
Today, Glaser’s logo has inspired a new version that its designer, Graham Clifford, has described as “modernized.” The New York Times reports that the new logo isn’t so much a replacement as it is a supplemental option meant to represent a new era of New York. According to the Times, ‘We ? NYC’ was meant to live alongside ‘I ? NY,’ but the Empire State Development, which oversees the marketing of the original logo, has sanctioned the use of the new version.
Clifford swapped Glaser’s use of rounded serif typeface American Typewriter with an adapted version of Helvetica, the font found on NYC’s subway signs. He also changed the original heart, which was always a flat, 2D image, with a rounded heart emoji that, according to Clifford’s website, is intended to express “all the vitality and variety of the five boros.”
In an email, Clifford said that the team is planning to build out a visual system based on emojis. “The We ? NYC mark will evolve as we continue to add more emojis to the library,” he said, noting the new emojis will be specific to quintessentially New York City things like the five boroughs, Broadway, and others. “We hope the identity system grows along with community spirit and optimism within the city,” he said.
The city’s decision to riff on a logo that is so synonymous with New York City has inevitably sent shockwaves of frustration and confusion across the internet. The switch from “I” to “We” undoubtedly speaks to the city’s desire to unify people and “cut through divisiveness and negativity,” as Kathryn Wylde, who is president and chief executive of the Partnership for New York City, told the New York Times. (The Partnership for New York City is the consortium of corporations and business executives that led the ‘We ? NYC’ campaign.)
The vision for the new look is a little less evident, but the use of emoji suggests a willingness to be more aligned with the times, while the font reflects a desire to appeal to anyone and everyone who may come across the logo. Only time will tell if any of this will pan out, or if the new branding will be swallowed whole by an angry Twitter-mob. The real test, I suppose, will be if ‘We ? NYC’ ever finds its way on a G-string, much like the original did.
Either way, the new version can’t hold a candle to Glaser’s original design, not just because of its idiosyncratic simplicity, but also because of the way it came about: serendipitously, with none of marketing try-hardism that underpins its more modern counterpart. Compared to the well-worn loveliness of Glaser’s logo, ‘We ? NYC’ is unmistakably contrived. And though the underlying sentiment is lovely, replacing Glaser’s logo with a beating-heart emoji seems more heartless than helpful.
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