DarJoLe

Better late than never I guess...

Does anybody have photos of this year's sponsor pavilions? And also of that fan zone at the apex of the Park?

Paralympic look is only swapping out the Olympic rings for the Paralympic Agitos, and adding sponsor boards to the corrals around the field of play. However, from that shot above it looks to me like they are simply covering up the Olympic rings with blue tarpaulin...

After the bright festival colours of London and Rio I wonder if Tokyo will go back to a smaller, muted, but crisp palette of colours. I can definitely see venues using the indigo blue of the logo but with sharper pops of brighter colours in certain areas say around the Rings/Agitos. As much as I would love to see red embraced it is not a good colour for TV and tends to 'bleed' on camera. It will also be interesting to see how much digital Tokyo embrace. Digital tier dressing is now commonplace across the sporting world, but cost and reluctance from the IOC has led to print-based venue look being the default. Whether Tokyo begins to nudge the IOC towards an animated look in their venues remains to be seen. I would love for the pictograms to be similar to the CGI animations at the handover, almost 3D-esque with a hint of 'Tron'. I have good feelings about Tokyo. Like London I think they could really take the concept of a 100% integrated look of a games to new heights which I don't think Rio delivered.

London changed the colour combination for certain sports, aquatic sports were blue and yellow for example, more action-orientated orange and blue, blue and orange, etc. Heritage venues were a combination of purple and another colour. But London kept the overall graphic element the same throughout, so you had the burst graphic around the Olympic rings and radiating lines consistent across all the venues surrounding the field of play, it was just the colours that changed. Rio's look comes from the overall graphic which they have cropped into, the issue being the crop is different for the field of play surrounds for the blue venues to the green venues to orange venues, and I believe this is what is causing a bit of inconsistency in the venues. I'm not sure it's necessarily the wrong approach, after all there is no real correct approach to an Olympic look, but it might have been better to either remove all non-green/orange/blue elements from the tier dressing, or use a section of all the colours. The hurdles, for example in athletics, had bits of the red and purple section of the Rio overall graphic, which looked a bit jarring with the majority blue and green venue. There have been some excellent moments with the look though which have bettered on London's; they managed to change the shape of the kayak boat numbers to the pebble shape which in London the sport federation were reluctant to, as well as the horse jump flags which was an absolute battle in London because of the sharp shard shape. It's just a shame the wayfinding, no doubt because of cost, has been a very standardised rectangular shape and not something like the pebble shape boards we saw when the look renders were unveiled. Tokyo will be interesting to see what kind of 'shape' their look takes on, in some ways after the bombastic festival and hi-colour look of London and Rio I wonder if they will go the other way and look more towards a sharp dark blue look with hints of red. We shall see.

The IOC will never allow the Paralympics to come first. It's an interesting political relationship between the two; the IOC do not particularly care about the IPC and what happens at the Paralympics, once the Olympic Closing Ceremony is done they are off and out of there. LOCOG was always challenged by the IOC as to why London 2012 was so integrated as an OCOG, they were never particularly enthused by the Games having the same logo for example, let alone decisions being made about the Olympics as to whether they affected the Paralympics. We were always warned against mentioning 'transition' (the logistics of turning an Olympic venue into a Paralympic venue) to the IOC as a reason to why something Olympic-related might not happen in the look, for example. The IPC on the other hand actually like being associated with the Olympics. It gives the Paralympic movement kudos and for them in some way they see the Olympics as the warm up to their event (which was the angle Channel 4 took in London in promoting the event). The biggest issue the Paralympics face is sponsorship and getting that into the games through advertising within the look for example, which was the biggest concern for the IPC on their visits and not, unlike the Olympics, about getting the event logos in the right places for broadcast and media.

The velodrome was looking excellent last night, very sharp.

It's really unfortunate Rio seems to have had problems with the delivery of the look. Whilst in some areas you can get away with a 'what the public don't know won't hurt them' it's annoying to see the lamp post holders actually still in place in the Olympic Park awaiting the banners. Whether these come remain to be seen. The dressing of the venues is rather haphazard, but they seem to have got the logos and FOP look in the right places, so the media at least should be happy with their shots. Some of the actual fitting leaves a lot to be desired, there's some ill-fitting tier dressing in some venues and it doesn't seem like it has been cared for in its installation in others. The high winds in the Park damaging barriers is unfortunate but it seems there's a people and logistics problem in clearing them up. At the end of the day its the sport that takes the priority and despite its complexities look is always seen even within most of the Organising Committees as nothing more than colour and wallpaper but it is an integral part of any Games's success. It's certainly working its magic in the colour stakes and bringing the sports to life and hopefully even though the Games have started the obvious challenges can be overcome.

Few more coming in...

I think it's a bit early to tell at this stage with just one sport. At the end of the day the logos all have to be in certain places along the length of tiers anyway, and the look or pattern that goes in between is repeated along the tier and around the venue. London's was the burst shard graphic around the Olympic Rings/Agitos with a hot spot of colour behind that faded to dark where the host city name was. Rio's is a crop of the blobby landscape graphic from which different elements of look are created. From what I have seen so far though, whether it be time constraints or budget cuts that dressing the venues has been an issue. London had this right up to the start of the Games but Rio seems to have only dressed parts of the football stadiums that are on camera for events rather than the whole venue. This may be because of ceremony factors though and more will appear overnight and before the next event. We will see. Gymnastics looks great with the all-green as a contrast to London's all-magenta and looking forward to seeing the orange of the beach volleyball. The colour will certainly pop and be memorable on TV and in photos.

I believe the venue colours are Orange FOP, green tiers Green FOP, orange tiers Blue FOP, green tiers The screen surrounds seem to match what the tier dressing is supposedly eventually to appear in the venues yet to have them dressed.

Very interesting to note that with the gymnastics and women's football so far, they have only dressed the first tier of the venue that faces the camera. Budget restrictions may have curtailed dressing the whole venue which is a real shame.

London wouldn't have won the Games if it had proposed a football stadium as legacy of an Olympic athletics stadium.

I wouldn't say the amount of residential space has been reduced, as there's something of rather significant height going to the north of the V&A site (which is still under wraps). Something that is good though is the original intention of animating the canal side here with restaurants and bars is to continue and could become a very special space once complete. No idea if they bell is intended to be rung, it would be good though to hear it ring every 27th of the month at 20.12! For anyone who hasn't been yet the Village is now fully accessible to the public with Victory Park and the Portlands wetlands walk open to all.

The latest plans are for the Bell to be located in the northern gardens of the stadium, which will be the newly landscaped area to the immediate north of the stadium which during the Games was the collection of food kiosks (pretty much where there was speculation before the Games of the location of the tall tower cauldron). This landscaping will be similar to the canal side landscaping and allow people to walk across the green Victorian bridge in the centre of the Park and up onto the stadium podium level and around the canal to the stadium car park and onwards to the Lea Navigation canal and Greenway. There was an LLDC meeting recently about the location of the 9/11 memorial which consists of a steel column of the former WTC. The finalised location is on the new grassy hill outside the Aquatics Centre between the car park and Pool Road, but the LLDC are not completely taken with this location, as it does not feel the location is of the calibre required for such a memorial site, and its presence in the backdrop of the Aquatics Centre and the Orbit. The design for the V&A museum are also being finalised and will be made public in the next few months. It's located on the former site of the Waterpolo Arena and takes up the whole plot as the new building, with its plaza level connecting seamlessly to the Stratford Bridge opposite the Aquatics Centre. It is significantly larger in scale than the Aquatics Centre, very different aesthetically and is certainly what I would term an 'iconic' piece of architecture, although that turn of phrase these days is met with slight disdain. It certainly has the 'attraction' power needed to pull people to spend more time in the Park. There's definitely a lot more to come in the Park and around the Orbit the results of which will properly kick off this summer, and the Invictus Games taking place in September will again recreate some of the Park-wide magic not seen since the 2012 Games. Definitely a very healthy future ahead.

Victoria to Oxford Circus and then the Central line to Stratford is the quickest route, 28 minutes.

SPIRIT OF 2012 TRUST LAUNCHES 27TH NOVEMBER 2013 Today marks the launch of the Spirit of 2012 Trust, an independent organisation established with a Big Lottery Fund endowment of £40 million. It has the challenging and exciting task of helping to deliver a lasting social and community legacy from the London 2012 Games. The Spirit of 2012 Trust has four key aims: • Harness the positive and generous volunteering spirit that was embodied by the London 2012 Gamesmakers to benefit communities across the UK. • Build on the potential of the energy, creativity and optimism inspired by the London 2012 Games to engage groups of people into social action. • Use local and national events as a catalyst for the creation of partnerships which will develop community activities that encourage more people to get involved in their neighbourhoods and local interest groups, whether they be choirs, or sports clubs. • Enhance the understanding of the barriers disabled people must and do overcome in daily life, as well as in the glamorous arena of Paralympic sport, to succeed in their goals and ambitions, and by doing so to help dispel limiting perceptions and negative attitudes. Spirit of 2012 Trust Chair Dugald Mackie, said: “2012 demonstrated that the huge energy and optimism generated by an event can be powerful. The Spirit of 2012 Trust will work through events in the future to ensure we use that power as a catalyst for positive social change and I am very proud to take a lead role in this exciting initiative." The Spirit of 2012 Trust has been set up by the Big Lottery Fund to secure a lasting legacy from the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games for communities right across the UK, building on the successes of the summer of 2012 that went beyond sport, for example the Torch Relay and Cultural Olympiad, the Trust will work with projects across the boundaries of community sport, culture and the arts, education and volunteering. Chair of the Big Lottery Fund Peter Ainsworth commented: “The London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games caught the imagination of this country like no other event I have witnessed. The Big Lottery Fund has a vital role to play in making sure that the spirit, optimism and hope we saw in London 2012 remains alive for years to come. This was the spark that led me to pledge that the money we receive from the sale of the Olympic and Paralympic Village would go back into making that legacy a reality for communities across the UK. The launch of the Spirit of 2012 Trust today marks the start of that exciting journey and I am absolutely delighted to hand the batton on to them.” The funding has been welcomed by Lord Coe, who said: “The Spirit of 2012 Trust now has a fantastic opportunity to capture that positivity and inspire future generations by supporting a range of exciting ideas around the UK. Just as the Games took 10 years to win, plan and deliver, so legacy must be seen as a 10-year project to realise lasting change. This funding will help deliver that lasting change.” Nick Hurd, Cabinet Office Minister, said: “We are absolutely committed to ensuring that we build on the phenomenal success of London 2012. The Spirit of 2012 Trust will play a key role in bringing the ambitious vision of the legacy to life and in securing the long term benefits of hosting the Games.” The Spirit of 2012 Trust is being officially launched today at a reception in the House of Lords hosted by Baroness Sue Campbell and attended by Baroness Tanni-Grey Thompson and Cabinet Office Minister Nick Hurd. More information can be found at www.spiritof2012trust.org.uk. Contact the Trust at info@spiritof2012trust.org.uk or follow us on Twitter@So2012Trust For all media contact Rachael Christophides, Director of Communications and Marketing at the Spirit of 2012 Trust, on 07968 194385. NOTES TO EDITORS: SPIRIT OF 2012 TRUST• The Spirit of 2012 Trust is a new independent trust established with £40 million of Big Lottery Fund funding and tasked with securing a lasting social and community legacy from the London 2012 Games. • The £40 million of funding from the Fund is an endowment in advance of the refund from the sale of the Olympic and Paralympic Village. • The Spirit of 2012 Trustees are: Dugald Mackie, Baroness Tanni Grey-Thompson, Baroness Sue Campbell, John Gartside, Sir Nicholas Kenyon, Paul Cuttill OBE, Sir Harry Burns, David Watters and Jan Paterson. More information on the Trust and its Trustees can be found atwww.spiritof2012trust.org.uk THE BIG LOTTERY FUND• The Big Lottery Fund, the largest distributor of National Lottery good cause funding, is responsible for giving out 40% of the money raised for good causes by the National Lottery. • The Fund is committed to bringing real improvements to communities and the lives of people most in need and has been rolling out grants to health, education, environment and charitable causes across the UK. Since its inception in 2004 it has awarded close to £6bn. • The Fund was formally established by Parliament on 1 December 2006. • Since the National Lottery began in 1994, 28p from every pound spent by the public has gone to good causes. As a result, over £30 billion has now been raised and more than 400,000 grants awarded across arts, sport, heritage, charities, health, education and the environment.

One of the things I'm interested in seeing is how Rio will translate their look into 3D spaces. I think we're already seeing hints in the renders of the Olympic Park, with the twisting walkway through the centre with its graphics embedded, similar to what London did with its grid and shard pattern emanating from the stadium onto the Park concourse. Also if they are using the logo as a starting point it will be interesting to see how this is extrapolated into 3D gantries, signage and wayfinding pieces. London was clever in that the nature of its linear triangular look meant architectural structures were easy to physically implement within their budget, more complex curves might be a larger challenge for Rio. Whatever they do, I just hope it is even more imaginative in terms of its scope on the field of play and pushes the level of integration even further than London managed.

One year later and still can't get the correct London 2012 and logo!

There's a Look book in the works but I gather only LOCOG people will be getting it. Maybe it will appear online. Mine's a bit more related to the history of the Park but it's taking its time, I was supposed to have it ready at Easter but things have slipped. I can't say I've had a massive amount of interest though, the jamboree has obviously moved on, but it was never really about getting massive sales but more my story of how and why I ended up working at the Games. "It's a bit too 'me me me'" as one publisher said. There's some work on my website, but it's tailored more towards what I specifically did than the whole team, and it's a bit bigging me up to get work. But it has some nice pics. http://figureandgrounduk.com

They matched the colour scheme of their venue. The original pictograms designed by Someone agency had the silhouette box version (which were used for wayfinding) and the dynamic line version (which were used for the look). Originally before Futurebrand (the agency who conceived the original strategy for the look of the Games) came up with the idea of different venue colours the box versions were the four original brand colours (orange, magenta, blue, green and black) and the dynamic ones blue and magenta. I think this was around 2008 they were released. Around 2009 Futurebrand were brought in to develop the look of the Games, taking the logo and existing brand designed by Wolff Olins, Headline typeface by Gareth Hague and pictograms by Someone and develop it into a strategy to dress the venues, the city, live sites, torch, etc etc. The golden thread was the 'one look' concept, that whatever touchpoint an athlete, spectator, member of the IOC, press, etc, came across that was to do with London 2012, it should all read from the same family. That was the general 'physical' graphic, which what we see is the grids, shards of energy, straight line angular feel. On top of this, they came up with the idea of the venues taking on different colours, displaying the diversity of London and the UK, yadda yadda. It was to attract attention, keep people (and youth especially) interested as the cameras moved between sports and venues, and to give a bit of individuality to aspects of the Games so it wasn't simply one big graphic rubber stamped over everything like previous Games had done. It was a bit more creative and allowed a bit more freedom in achieving a better result. The idea loosely was the sports took on certain characteristics, so more action physical combat sports would be in orange venues, water sports in blue, etc. This sort of got changed a bit over time but the overall concept was still there and finalised by the beginning of 2010. They added purple to the existing Wolf Ollins colour palette, to give a regal feel to the more historical venues, and tweaked the green because the original was too dark on camera. So to cut a long story short there were 4 main venue colours, purple, orange, blue, magenta, and then they then had a contrasting colour, so in total there were 11 different colour ways. And then this thinking was then applied across the board through pretty much every piece of branded collateral, so... the venues themselves, the venue banners, the venue tickets, the venue video screen animations, the merchandise sold at the venue, the venues page on the website, the venue page on the various mobile apps. Anything based around the sports in a venue were given this colour scheme. So, going back to your point, the pictograms took on the colours of the venues, so all the banners at, say, Earls Court, the volleyball pictogram was blue and white on an orange background. All the tickets for the Aquatic Centre (3 Olympic sports; swimming, diving, syncro plus 1 Paralympic, swimming) were blue with a yellow and white pictogram. Outside of the venues things were a little different, the city scrim around town that had all the different pictograms randomly on them were in different colours (but still in venue combinations). This was because there were six variants of the scrim (the total number of colours in the London 2012 look; purple, orange, magenta, blue, green, yellow, plus a black used where we couldn't have colour). All in all despite there being a rigid system for the venues there was flexibility outside when needed. That was part of the strength of the brand really. It gave it quite a creative vibe as well because it was never a brand that had say one dominant colour (although obviously the magenta seems to stick in people's minds because of the wayfinding) or default setting. The fact the boroughs could choose what colour scrim and live site banners they wanted was a positive from them, very 'everyone's 2012' and all that. I like to think overall we did a good job, I know a few are wary of praising the design itself but the sheer scale and aptitude of the design in the fact it was so coherent wherever it was it certainly something I'm pretty proud of being a part of.