Iconic Identities: Bell Canada
Bell Canada is a world famous telecommunications company in Canada
We are all familiar with Bell a telecommunications company that’s historically one of the most important companies in Canada and the world. So let's discuss the details of the iconic Bell identity.
The Bell Story
We all know the story of Bell and Alexander Graham Bell, the inventor of the telephone. He designed and created a device enabling us to transmit human speech in real time, across time and space. The device was patented in 1876 in the US and Canada. The telephone is a device we all use today, but we now use a modernized and totally transformed smart phone version—we're dependent on for daily communication. Cell phones, smartphones, Internet, smart homes, and connected things are all inventions made that branched off from Bell’s telephone.
Today Bell Canada, the Canadian Telecommunications and media company is headquartered in Montreal, Quebec.
“Canada is and always has been at the forefront of communication technology, beginning with the first phone call made in the world by Alexander Graham Bell from Brantford, Ontario to Paris, Ontario, in 1876” (Media & Communications in Canada (Ninth Edition), 2020, p. 159).
Who Designed the Bell Canada Logo
The latest Bell Canada identity was redesigned by Zulu Alpha Kilo. Bell also completed the branding platform with their own typeface, Bell Slim, created by a Canadian typographer, Ian Brignell.
The Bell Identity Elements
Bell has designed a typographic font to align with the Bell iconic brand identity. The typeface offers tight kerning in a sans serif type. It’s clean, clear, bold and easily identifiable as unique typeface. A conservative yet modern blue colour is consistently used throughout brand materials to unify the identity. There are no objections to a typographic identity and we’re fans of font only logos at Actually. Here’s a link to Bell’s logo application standard PDF visually demonstraing the core brand elements.
A simple yet strong re-brand that ZAK modernized to stay current for years to come. It’s interesting how the design firm illustrates consumers in demo mode using the project, while carrying the brand identity throughout various types of media such as magazine ads, banner ads, vehicles and product brochures. Here are some examples of how the branding elements has been used in the past as well as a short film which displays the generations of people who used Bell technology to communicate and connect us.
Tell us what you know about the iconic Bell Canada identity. Leave us your comments in the section below.
Resources
Gasher, M., Skinner, D., & Coulter, N. (2020). Media & Communications in Canada (Ninth Edition). Oxford University Press.
The original article was published on October 5, 2012.