10 Innovative Landmark & Monument Sign Ideas
A brand is a method of communicating a good or service.
Since the 1920’s, when companies began designing logos specifically for a range of functions, a corporate monument sign has been central to brand design.
Today major brands like Starbucks, Amazon and Google spend millions of dollars to design icons that can work at varying scales and environmental conditions.
IDS is an organization that specializes in adapting brands to physical environments; particularly monument signs, corporate signs and other business signs, and outdoor signage.
When IDS incorporates a brand icon into a sign we consider four key areas:
Scale: For an identity to work it must be seen. In outdoor conditions signs always appear smaller when seen in a large area and larger in a small space.
IDS utilizes 3D visualization tools to test scale in the environment and in relation to the landscape or architecture.
Illumination: Most monument signs are illuminated, which adds a great deal of complexity.
Illuminated colors need to be tested to ensure they still match the brand icon.
Testing the lumen output to make sure the sign is visible is also important, particularly against the light clutter of urban environments.
IDS works heavily through prototype to ensure that sign lighting matches the brand.
Materials: Material choice and finish plays a major role when an icon is translated into an object.
IDS focuses on exploring materials through best practice examples to gauge the impact of a material as a method of communication.
The types of materials available range from aggressively modern metal finishes to natural stone and wood.
Family: In a campus environment, healthcare facility or office complex, where many signs are used, IDS focuses on how the brand identity will work under different conditions.
A large sign may have an icon and text while a small element may just have a color. This entire family must be seen as working together in an environment.
Innovative Landmark & Monument Sign Ideas
#1 Kodak Center, Rochester, NY
Scale: IDS developed with architects SWBR the façade for Kodak Performing Arts Center to further the identity of the brand into an institutional area.
#2 Discovery Business Campus, Tempe, AZ
Materials: This landmark sign uses landscape, multiple materials and water to portray grandeur.
#3 Syracuse University, Syracuse NY
Family: Working with leading planning and landscape architects EDR, IDS developed an exterior wayfinding system at Syracuse University based on the new brand designed by Pentagram. The signage used variations of color, shape and type iconography to support a wide range of sign types.
#4 Rancho Vista Corporate Center, San Diego, CA
Materials: This monument sign for HP is simple but the offsetting materials make it very powerful
#5 USACE, Washington DC
Illumination: This sign by SC Design shows that sun and shadow makes for a great lighting effect.
#6 Court Square Building, Baltimore, MD
Scale: This scrim by Ashton Design shows the power of monumental scale for branding.
#8 Museumplein, Amsterdam, Netherlands
Scale: One of the most emulated sign approaches ever developed, the large scale letters are photographed thousands of times per day.
#9 Penguin Cube, Dubai
Wayfinding: These temporary monuments by PenguinCube in Dubai show the power of even the simplest monuments to define a place.
#10 Trinity College, Hartford, CT
Scale: This simple sign is carefully integrated into both the building and the local landscape.
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