As a designer I love branding. I really enjoy and find such passion for making a brand come to life from a simple sketch. I always love seeing a fantastically branded project which you can see has had love and passion put into it.
I’m sure I’m not the only person that has a weird, morbid fascination about the exclusion zone and everything that happened that dreadful night. There was the mini series in 2020 on Netflix which I know was super popular then there was more recently a documentary on channel 5, in March 2021 with Ben Fogle, so I am not alone in my weird fascination.
My first impression of this project was just “Wow!” It’s such a strange brief and so different but on the other hand makes so much sense. This work was done by a Ukrainian design agency called Banda who have worked with clients all across the globe.
The logo is really beautiful. It’s not just one logo however. It changes for all the years up until the reactor will be fully decommissioned in the year 2064, each year a small part of it disappearing. It displays the impact and how long this disaster has affected the area. The shape of the first logo from 1986 is the shape of the surface of the reactor four.
Banda said, ‘We needed to find a strong visual image that would make people think. And realised that the standard logo will not have enough power: a static icon is not able to contain such an important message. So we created the world's first everlasting logo.'
Another beautiful touch to this branding is the fact that the logo won’t change on January 1st but from April 26th on the date of the disaster, thereby creating a new year specifically for the exclusion zone.
I know some people will ask why did this need to be branded, but I will give you Banda’s reply…‘the tragedy that occurred on April 26, 1986 at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant. One night turned the place of the future into a place of memory that reminds the whole world of the price of human error. But few people know that the cities of the Chernobyl zone are gradually disappearing: they are being destroyed by time and absorbed by nature. This means that over time, people will lose the ability to see the direct consequences of the disaster. We decided to create an Exclusion Zone branding to draw attention to the disappearance of memory sites. Because we want people to have time to see everything live. See and learn an important lesson: every action has a consequence.’
To go along with this branding, there will be merchandise which will change in the April of each year. Creating something of a historical moment in itself and something people can collect as memorabilia. They have also created a website which is just as wonderful as the logos. It has subtle but beautiful movement on the information page which explains more about the exclusion zones and sites you can visit. The landing page shows all the logos from start to end if you hold your cursor either side it moves.
I will leave you with the last line on the Banda website:
‘04/26/86 Chernobyl changed the world. And now Chernobyl is changing with it.’
(All images belong to Banda Agency)
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