Last Wednesday morning, Italian president Romano Prodi and his minister of culture, Francesco Rutelli, unveiled a new logo and slogan for the country. The slogan reads ‘Italy leaves its mark’ and the presentation coincided with the launch of the Italy portal, www.italia.it.

There are plenty of views expressed on designer’s sites and on the whole they are negative. The attention is hardly surprising given the wide ranging views people will have surrounding how a country is represented by a symbol.

Prodi comments that Italy should have “a graphic symbol which delivers a message”. What message does the symbol portray to you? How important is a logo in determining the success of a country’s brand? Does the green shape remind you of mini golf, the shape of Italy or something else?

I came across the new logo yesterday afternoon and after a second look today I’m perched on the uninspired side of the fence. One of my main criticisms is the use of four fonts, differing weights and mixed cases. It emotes a tired, complicated and inconsistent feel.

For a short while, I wondered if the green shape symbolised the Italian land mass, however, the intended meaning of the soft lettering is to represent “movement, flexibility and imagination”. This may be the case nonetheless it instilled a degree of confusion.

The long and the short
The logo above is the full version and the abbreviated two letter configuration to the right will be the primary identity, a practical approach bearing in mind the country’s top level domain is .it.

How does the logo reflect my view of Italy as a potential visitor?
I’ve been to Italy on only one occasion, a week backpacking through cities and tourist attractions on a much forgotten but fondly remembered train trip. The hustle and bustle of Rome certainly ties in with the manic like feelings stirred up by this logo. Art and design, culture, history and fashion are areas that come to mind as Italy’s key strengths. These elements evoke sophistication and craft not apparent in this logo.

Italy is already one of the world’s most desirable tourist destinations, coming third in the second global Country Brand Index of 2006, therefore does it matter that much if the rest of the new Italy brand is strong? Not really.

However, I don’t think that’s the point - I believe an opportunity has been missed to create a more unified statement.

A poster comments that the ‘it’ mark as a standalone works well with the three elements and certainly the shortened version is not as convoluted. He makes a point that the green shape may intentionally be shoeless, to go in the face of the boot cliche and that it emphasises the more accessible north, where more major tourism destinations are located. Not sure of Italy’s tourism statistics but I would think areas such as Tuscany and Sicily, amongst others, make up a high percentage.

Leaving aside the inevitable, insatiable demands of designers, creating a logo for a country must be an incredibly difficult and challenging exercise and time will tell how the logo supplements the international and wide ranging branding efforts that will follow.

Links

• Italia: Like you’ve Never Seen it Before - Opinions on corporate and brand identity work.
• designerblog and SocialDesignZine - Italian design blogs discussing logo, recommend Babelfish for translation.
• Ansa.it article covering the launch of the new logo and slogan.