Beirut City Museum Branding

Tarek Atrissi Design was commissioned to develop the branding for the Beirut City Museum; a museum complex in the process of being built in central Beirut, Lebanon- and that required a visual identity to launch its promotion and to set the visual guidelines for the exhibition and environmental design within the interior of the museum.

The logo is a wordmark using an Arabic typographic composition that consists of a matrix of fragments; reflecting the mosaic of stories that the museum aims to narrate. The museum building, designed by “Renzo Piano Building Workshop”, is intended to tell Beirut’s history and memory. The logos reflects the narrative aspect of the museum by connecting abstract forms – that symbolize the artifacts found in the city- and piecing it together to read the name of the museum. The negative white space in the logo – created by the joined pieces of abstract black forms- remains very legible while being the result of an experimental typographic exercise. The rich typographic forms within the logo are the main visual elements used to create different graphic compositions.

The Beirut City Museum will present a strategic approach to protect, preserve, enhance and better present Beirut History and Archaeological Heritage, both as a focus of national cultural identity, as well as an exceptional visitor destination that displays the multilayered heritage of the city of Beirut. The museum is located within the Ancient Tell that signifies the earliest settlement in Beirut. Comprising of both the building and the outdoor extension of the Ancient Tell, the Beirut City Museum is a site museum that offers the opportunity to tell the story of Beirut through the content of the new building and in situ in the archaeological park.