New York NY
The New School has a new identity. The institution turned to Pentagram and Paula Scher to create the university’s new look and to express its vision as an integrated institution with “design-inspired thinking essential for success in the emerging creative economy” at the center of its curriculum.
The aesthetics of the identity system are inspired by the architecture and typography of the school’s new LEED certified University Center, while also incorporating parallel lines that echo the horizontal striations of the landmark Joseph Urban building nearby. As part of the identity, Scher commissioned a bespoke typeface from Peter Bil’Ak dubbed Neue.
It is composed of extended letterforms and governed by a custom algorithm, revolutionary in its combination of regular, extended and very extended widths of the same font programmed together and used seemingly at random. Each individual school within the university appears underneath the primary logo. The university also commissioned a Pantone color, Parsons Red, to honor the history and centrality of the Parsons School of Design.
