Madrid City Council has taken advantage of the Christmas lights switch-on last November 22 to unveil a new visual identity and say goodbye to the electric blue and the logo that had accompanied the city for almost two decades. The update does not touch the official coat of arms or flag, but it does touch the symbol used in campaigns, marquees, websites and networks: a more simplified and minimalist Bear and Strawberry Tree, the seven stars repositioned at the top and a much darker and more sober palette of blues, designed to work better on screens, apps and digital formats.
The mayor, José Luis Martínez-Almeida, explained this past Monday in statements to the media that the redesign “has cost zero euros” because it has been developed internally from the General Directorate of Communication, and that it seeks to adapt the municipal brand “to today’s communication requirements”. The new logo maintains all the recognizable elements, bear, strawberry tree, crown and stars, but eliminates details, simplifies lines and seeks minimalism, the prevailing trend in branding in recent years.
New logo, new slogan for Madrid
The change also comes with a new institutional slogan, Madrid, where paths cross, with which the government team wants to emphasize the role of the city as a meeting point for cultures, people and projects. The typography is also updated: the more neutral letters disappear and the Chulapa enters with force, a font created in 2019, of Castilian inspiration, which had already been used in the historical street map and now becomes the graphic voice of the City Council in many supports.
Not everything has been applause. In social networks and part of the opposition have criticized that the result mixes a bear and a very schematic strawberry tree with a crown and more detailed stars, generating a certain “pastiche” between different languages, and have questioned the lack of public competition and transparency in the process. Even so, the consistory defends that it is a simple retouching, not a rupture, and that the implementation will be gradual so as not to increase the cost of existing stationery, signage or signage.