From the Series
Exhibiting archaeology, geology, geography and cosmology, MUSE is a living museum nestled in the foothills of the Dolomites in the small town of Trento in Italy.
It was a diagram in a book, The Keepers of Genesis, about the relationship of the Giza plateau pyramids to the stars, that inspired Harry Pearce of Pentagram to design a logotype for MUSE that relates to the mountains that create the Trento valley in northern Italy.
“In form, the logo is folded in two to create the metaphor of the mountains and its valley. The MUSE logotype creates its own valley, and is orientated at a particular angle, taken from the building’s apex. Images and typography float in the illusionary valley space,” Pentagram explains.
Like the museum, the logo presents stories with a chameleon-like identity that can be modified to accommodate a variety of content and audiences.
The colour of the logo changes to best fit the context and the identity can be used in two separate ways: close-in and pulled back. When close-in, the logo offers a local view and narrates a specific story. When pulled back, the identity offers a wider perspective including earth and the solar system. Either can be used, depending on the nature of the narrative.
“The idea for the identity had to be so much more, it had to be universal,” says Pearce.
