2013–2016

Confluences Museum

The challenge in developing the visual identity for the Musée des Confluences was to design a graphic system that would resonate with a very broad audience—not limited to France—while incorporating the distinctive architectural icon created by Coop Himmelb(l)au and the project’s geographical location.

Thus, the identity system was designed to embody these distinctive features of the museum. First, its location on an extraordinary site at the tip of the triangle where the Rhône and Saône rivers meet. Second, the architectural design, which draws heavily on the geological setting and reinforces the notion of a tapered triangle. The third exceptional aspect is the museum’s ambitious content. The graphic proposal connects these elements. It is based on two rectangular surfaces intersecting at a 7° angle to create a white triangular surface and an overlapping triangular surface between two images. The first triangle symbolizes the museum’s location, and the second symbolizes the meeting of the waters and, beyond that, the convergence of scientific themes, subjects, images, and objects. The typographic element “Musée des Confluences” reinforces the empty triangle by encircling it. Its composition is also defined by a 7° angle. This principle will be applied throughout all communications. The graphic system also relies on iconography, with the principle of overlapping two image surfaces serving as the primary identifying element. The visual identity thus aligns with the museographic project: creating a meeting of elements of different natures, this “confluence”—this confrontation—forming the basis for concepts, questions, and visual contrasts.

Design Team — Ruedi Baur and Chantal Grossen