For a long time considered as the largest city in the world, now has a more than deserved 3rd place according to the UN, with 20.4 million inhabitants, the agglomeration of the Metropolitan Zone of the Valley of Mexico similar to the city of New York and behind Tokyo (37.2 million) and Delhi (22.7 million), although the World Urbanization Prospects report foresees a slower growth and considers that in this decade it will be overtaken by other megacities in developing countries.

Great Central Megalopolis of Mexico

All in all, the changes in this city were remarkable, from its economic and political history, to its cultural dimension. Mexico City is a great destination that stands out, in short, for its historical center, better known as Zócalo, which is also a World Heritage Site declared by UNESCO and that shows a great living culture, inherited from the founding of Tenochtitlan up to our contemporary times in which the Mexican people and the visitors can enjoy a great art nouveau and art deco in its architecture and an infinity of museums that make it one of the cities in the world with more exhibition offerings.

Mexico City stands out for its cultural offer

All this makes Mexico City to have clear recognitions as the Destination # 1 to travel in 2016 that gave the New York Times and also the World Capital of Design in 2018, granted by the International Council of Societies of Industrial Design (ICSID).

World  Design Capital promotion

This badge is offered for large projects that seek to protect and promote the importance of design in society, in addition to strengthening the design industry worldwide.

From the ICSID this biennial title is assigned in an honorary way to cities, such as the Mexican capital, that stand out for their proposals and innovation in the topics of architectural, industrial, graphic and fashion design, always applying this work in urban revitalization with a positive impact on the economy, culture, the environment and, by extension, on all citizens.

In previous editions, the winners were Turin (2008), Seoul (2008), Helsinki (2012), Cape Town (2014) and Taipei (2016). All with the same common denominator: since half the population of the planet is living in urban areas, cities increasingly depend on those who know how to plan and design spaces in an efficient and functional way. This design is an indispensable tool to make cities more attractive and improve the lives of all its inhabitants.

For 2018 an open local program is expected in Mexico City: activities and a dizzying agenda that integrates a wide variety of responsible and sustainable design initiatives. International design exhibitions, conferences, exhibition platforms specialized in local design that will place this city in the international core of the most cutting-edge creative industry.

And in these times, you also have to say goodbye to the references “defeñas” of Mexico DF as it was always known, because it does not officially exist anymore. It is Mexico City, the capital of the United States of Mexico that, after changing its legal status, becomes the country’s 32nd entity.

Mexico City, not DF, comes from being a federal district and becomes, unambiguously, a complete state, with all the benefits that include. The main change for the city and its residents is that it is now a free state and shares the sovereignty of the Republic at the same level as the other federal entities. So far the DF had been divided into 16 delegations, but now these become mayorships, with their respective mayors, Council and their election is done with three-year law.

The same of the other states, Mexico City drafts its own constitution and with all this, it will enjoy greater financial stability by being able to benefit from federal funds like the other states.

External activities of the CDMX

It still retains the nation’s capital and the headquarters of the Union Powers, which is a great advantage. This is a profound change for the whole country of Mexico that adapts to the social and urban challenges of the 21st century.

The acronyms are others. We went from DF to CDMX, in a communication and branding campaign that few cities have. There were several actions as for example to launch balloons with the abbreviations in the European festivals of Spain, France and the United Kingdom, to logotype airplanes, appear at film festivals and reinforce the presence of this urban brand in all types of government communication.

Campaign to launch CDMX in the original hot air balloon

Change of naming without changing the urban essence of the territory, but helping its citizens to be a reference of vanguard, design and cooperation with the rest of the inhabitants of the country.

A great success for the city that will make 2018 undoubtedly a magnificent year.

Pike Place Market is an open place for the public in which artisans, merchants and local producers meet.

The city is very lively and it has high standards of quality that are shown in their lifestyle and also in their respect for the environment.

The Green Seattle Partnership is a partnership between the City of Seattle, Forterra, nonprofit community groups, businesses, schools and a large number of volunteers working together to restore and maintain the tree parks of city.

Seattle Parks

In fact, Forterra stands out for its environmental commitment that beyond the conservation of forests and urban green spaces, it also recognizes the need to safeguard the land, not as a museum piece, but as a useful element in each of the functions that the soil can have: wild lands, lands of work or simply open spaces for the health and welfare of the whole community.

Apart from Seattle, which is the city where it is based, Forterra is present throughout the State of Washington being there the leader in the awareness and the preservation of nature, also emphasizing its divulgation in Ellensburg and Tacoma.

The Green Seattle Partnership seeks, however, to leave a natural legacy for future generations and, in the short term, to conserve the urban forests as they improve the quality of life and give a cleaner environment and the possibility of everybody to enjoy nature close at hand.

The parks help clean the urban air in a very simple way. All trees can capture carbon dioxide and thus help remove soot and other pollutants, highlighting the role of Seattle conifers that grow year-round and that on average capture more than 13 tons of carbon dioxide per acre of trees.

On a mental level, the citizen who has near trees can see reduced stress, increased creativity and memory and it has been shown that spending time close by nature leads to an increase in empathy capacity making us more generous and decreasing the aggresiveness. This is a green weapon within reach of any city that Seattle has been able to use very well.

Washington State has many open spaces between cities and its metropolitan areas have large parks that for many residents without means (including time) are their main contact with nature, but this requires the collaboration of social, public and private actors for their proper protection.

This colorful green does not go unnoticed with respect to the rest of the country that sees Seattle as a North American lung.

Nature and origins that define the present urban shield.

Formerly Seattle was known as the Queen City although currently it is known as the Emerald City as a reference to all its number of green forests in its metropolitan area. Also its slogan for many decades was the City of Goodwill that would give place in 1990 to the second edition in this city of the Games of the Friendship, more internationally known like the Goodwill Games, just after its inauguration in Moscow, which was a multi-sport event created to seek good relations with the disappeared Soviet Union in the Cold War with the participation of 54 countries and the message of “Uniting the world’s best”. Thanks to the Goodwill Games Seattle not only gave an image of a bridge city between two worlds right at the beginning of the global era we now live, but at the local level there were a number of singular urban adaptations such as the King County Aquatic Center or the Husky Stadium.

Medal of Historical Goodwill Games.

Apart from the sports competitions, cultural activities also took place under the umbrella of the Goodwill Games Arts Festival where there was an exchange of art, entertainment, dance and science between the two economic blocks of the moment.

This event can be understood thanks to the openness of Seattle as one of its main values.

As for the visual, if Seattle has always standed out is for its unique skyline.

The city branding has always used – when it was possible –  internationally recognized monuments or buildings that in the case of Seattle has been and is the Needle Space adapted in all its urban iconography. It has been crowning Seattle for 50 years and it is 184 meters tall, and due to its location outside the center skyscrapers makes it stand out prominently in most promotional snapshots.

Seattle Space Needle in the city panorama.

In the middle of the digital era, the city of Seattle shows a renewed corporate brand. That has been the clear intention of Visit Seattle that presents a clean aesthetic, without any pretensions, with the emerald green color as the main emblem of the city and with a slight game of letters reminiscent of the mountains and architecture of the city but escaping from commercial clichés that have used other brands that are limited to using the beauty of its panorama as logos to explode.

Renovated corporate image of Visit Seattle.

Seattle is flora, it is a commitment to dialogue between cultures and it is respect for life and the citizen. One of the best cities to live in the United States and a key location for North American development and today for good neighborliness with Canada and the Pacific, and by extension, with the whole world.

Currently, apart from being the capital of Peru, it is also the political, cultural and financial center highlighting the other parts of the country, since its metropolitan area comprises 30% of the total population.

Lima residents in the city center

In the 20th century the historic center of Lima underwent a modernization and its population growth finally came to deteriorate in the late 70’s and 80’s when the traffic did damage the image of the city and the tranquility of pedestrians.

Original Pizarro’s Chess Board

To avoid some of this deterioration and promote recovery by the Peruvian authorities, UNESCO declared World Heritage the Convent of San Francisco in 1988 and three years later included the entire area of the historic center of Lima thanks to the originality of its plane and more than 600 monuments that one can find in what is known as Pizarro’s Chess Board. From this change of mind at the time of Alberto Andrade Carmona, Lima city experienced the recovery of all its architectural heritage, reducing crime and it was the key element for the start of the recuperation of a more walkable capital and with less pollution for the citizens.

Currently the corporate image of Lima is being developed, as the authorities are seeing the opportunities that are created to attract international investment in projects that are in progress, and what is on the table is, on the one hand, turn away from the own brand Peru, already exploited and reporting directly to the central government, and also, as was indicated by Armando Andrade, President of Interbrand and Pragma group and Head of the future brand-Lima  it is wanted  that “Citizens of Lima to stand and do Lima the city Peruvians and the world deserves”, also clarifying that it has to ward off the gastronomic clichés that has labeled the urban image and to focus on new more cross contemporary values.

PromPeru logo that includes all Peruvian cities

Meanwhile, the city of Lima grows in every way and also its outside promotion. Like the Olympic Games, the Pan American Games are a quadrennial sporting event but as its name suggests is held only with the participation of countries of the American continent. Has been held since Buenos Aires 1951 and in many cases it was a boost to global Olympic bids as it was Rio  in its celebration of the 2007 Pan American Games, a prelude to the Olympics 2016 in regard to facilities, events and receiving countries and athletes.

Recently it was held in Toronto (2015), but in the edition of 2019 in Lima is where we will see a massive change in the Peruvian capital.

It is important at this point to explain what this Master Plan 2019 is. The Lima city is adapting its entire vial, sport and hotel infrastructure to meet the challenge of the Pan American Games. Its main project in the sporting arena is the creation of a stadium for athletics, one for baseball, a velodrome and a new sports pavilion, and furthermore as it is logical in these projects, a large area of accommodation for sports teams and a medical area. These facilities will remain in the hands of the Peruvian population, as well as improving mass transit, that is comfortable and that gives confidence to national and international  visitors of this event.

Master Plan facilities

The spatial reorganization that involves a sporting event like this always has an impact which will benefit the long-term future of the city as well as its new urban image and identity, leading opportunities for integration, sustainability and urban improvement.

Thus, the main objective is incentive afterwards new program opportunities to strengthen this condition of urban space:

• A first-level sports infrastructure with an image and unique identity, linked to history and local culture.
• Green areas that are integrated into the city reassessing vacant and abandoned areas that Lima has now.
• Public spaces for social integration to help improve the quality of life of the surrounding neighborhoods.

To promote Lima brand and its Pan American Games it was presented a modern image that would help contextualize Peru with all its cultural background in the Latin American context.

Official Logo

The new logo is represented by Amancae flower that combines history, culture and tradition of the Pan American community with joy that surrounds the sport. The identity of the city is reflected in the colors and pistils that unite the Peruvian capital with the rest of the participating nations in the Americas. Its creation comes from the hand of the artists Juan Diego Sanz and Jorge Luis Zarate.

Specifically, it asserts that Amancae flower represents three athletes with open arms and the three Americas with the deepest and most remote identity of the ancient city of Lima.

Lima and the challenges of sustainable growth

The Pan American Games will be ultimately much more than a whitewash of the city. It is not only the creation of a differentiated own urban identity of the rest of the country, but it is improving a city that will be very influential, as an emerging capital that it is, in the next decade and that will target Lima residents in the new approach to its urban development.

The topics talk about a city of samba, football and beaches in its majestic sambadromes, Maracanã stadium or the Copacabana promenade, but the carioca city is much more.

In Rio 2016 more than 10,000 athletes from 206 National Olympic Committees are expected for a total of 42 sports, including for the first time rugby 7 and golf competitions and taking in four distinct areas of the city: Barra, Copacabana, Deodoro and Maracanã.

The city branding recreating in the Olympic Games 2016 tries conceptualize passion and the transformation of the city in a brand that has to represent unity and optimism.

Museu do Amanhã, Santiago Calatrava

Seeking to be original, the agency Tátil succeeded in uniting more than 40 professionals (planners, designers and editors) in the phase of a creative project that showed the collaborative effort of a team based on the values that were offered to the city.

In response to this primary brainstorming a “human” brand as a result of the fusion of different ethnicities, religions and generations was launched, which is the result of the carioca nature and Olympic spirit.

To demarcate this concept in the beauty of the urban landscape certain colors have been used in very concrete ways. Yellow symbolizes the sun and heat, blue for the water around us and green for forests and the hope that is the positive vision of this brand identity, contextualized in the shape of Sugarloaf Mountain, an image showing joy, celebration and friendship.

Conceptualization of the Rio 2016 logo

And there is not Olympic event without their mascots in this case are Vinicius and Tom, in honor of Brazilian musicians Vinicius de Moraes and Tom Jobim.

Vinicius and Tom

In order to improve Rio de Janeiro sustainability during the Olympic Games each of the operations carried out will be analyzed: works, volunteers, transport, food and drink, in order to minimize the impact of every visit that the city will receive.

An example that  the organization sets is the case of Lagoa Rodrigo de Freitas, where water conditions were monitored every morning, in the area of competition as the surroundings, preventing leaks, ensuring the cleanliness and respecting the flora and fauna, including the protection of the famous “Quero-Quero,” the bird local landmark.

Cleaning Rodrigo de Freitas lake before competition

Another example of sustainable development is to adapt the facilities to the elderly, pregnant women, the disabled citizens or people with reduced mobility. It ensures that all sporting events are accessible on the premises, car parks and other demarcated areas. The goal, anyhow, is that with the completion of the Olympic Games, Rio can also enjoy a legacy adapted to everyone and a modern image change that an important city like this needed to be at the forefront of urban humanization.

On the other hand, to make civil society more inclusive in Rio de Janeiro Project, new topics have been opened participating the neighbors as transparency, accessibility, protection of children or urban mobility, for example. Among the major projects that will take place in 2016, we can highlight “Transforma” (education), “Sobre Rodas” (accessibility) or the “Green Passport” (environment) in which will involve, in addition to citizens and volunteers Municipal Olympic Company, the Civil House of Rio de Janeiro and the Ministry of Sports.

Citizen participation in the Rio project

“Sobre Rodas” Project participants

In short, Rio will lay on the table a set of social actions that go beyond a simple facelift of the city and represent a radical change of the urban environment: 80% reuse of material infrastructure, overall reduction of carbon emissions, recycling cooperatives.

And as we enter 2016 and times have changed, Rio de Janeiro wants to show the world that it is a tolerant, diverse and open city. In his role around diversity and inclusion, Rio 2016 goes beyond a simple statement of principles and also opens the door to dialogue to sectors affected by the exclusion in Brazil, focusing on teams in discussions of gender, LGBT rights or the integration of the Rio black population in the project.

But is it easy to implement a global project? We all know that the organization and execution of a mega-sporting event requires a unique logistical complexity and a great political coalition. A lot of urban development projects involving an increase in public investment often encounter strong opposition. In this case of Rio and other cities, it seems that the Olympic system legitimizes everything. However, this “everything’s fair” of Olympic cities is facing serious contradictions as to meet the demands of the city and its inhabitants.

This contradiction between local demand and the Olympic demand, which need not be contradictory, in emerging countries clashes as three crucial factors like easy availability of resources, the ambition to strengthen its international image and weakness in many cases of its own institutions to protect human rights and the environment.

In this particular área, Brazil, as an emerging economy, has had to create a special framework to facilitate decision-making and in this case the contracts between parties were more binding than the rule itself. For local governments as Rio they have also developed master plans to authorize the works to private actors themselves, something that had already been carried out in municipal preparations of this and other Brazilian cities to be delegated the 2014 FIFA World Cup.

Rio 2016 facilities

In addition to these administrative matters, there is a greater scourge with which Latin America has to fight and Rio is no stranger. Until relatively recently the city had three murders a day and with the robberies did this Brazilian paradise, a place not recommended for tourism. Aware of this, the organization of the Olympics doubled the number of security forces with respect to London 2012.

Logically, security measures are a patch to a deeper problem that are social inequalities: not everything that is reported in the Western media tell the reality of Rio. Approximately more than 8,000 families living in the slums had to be withdrawn from their neighborhoods and settled in other areas to accommodate the Olympic project. The exile when is forced is not welcome and that is why many protests were held in the streets against a local government that benefits private interests rather than needs of the most vulnerable sectors of the population.

Protest against violence in Copacabana

To this must be added the energy problems and schedule of the works to approximate date; they have not finished as the deadline the velodrome, the tennis center or the aquatic park.

Despite doubts about the success of this mega sports and cultural event, Rio de Janeiro will make an outstanding job, as other Olympic cities. Brazil was already in 2014 on the spotlight for the World Cup and finally was successful. The challenge is not that the Olympic and Paralympic Games are correct, but the city can capitalize in the short and  the long term this huge investment.

The Brazilian economy is suffering and may increase its debt after the Games, but the qualitative value and urban identity of Rio de Janeiro will be strengthened and the following years will be the responsibility of the government to be a leader in the southern hemisphere with a profitable, secure and innovative urban brand.

View of Houston

The Southern America’s largest city is known for its fusion of TexMex and the huge number of flavors that have brought the migrations of workers.

It has always been reknowned as a city for intrepid entrepreneurs, engineers, technicians and executives. Houston is the energy capital of the world thanks to its industrial base, the center of manufacturing, aeronautics and its port, the country’s first in tonnage, but is also home for 25 of the 500 companies with more capital of the world and, on average, the adult people with a university degree in this city of Texas earn 10% more than their teammates elsewhere in the United States and thus Houston ranks as first in the top cities for recent graduates.

And not all the time is invested in exploiting energy but there are also a large number of cultural activities with its museums, theaters and other attractions. Without going any further, Houston has up to 83 museums and cultural centers, and offers outdoor performances in Cullen Park and George Bush Park, a unique place and one of the largest urban parks throughout America. One of the most unknown of global Houston is just its own museum district which hosts an exclusive collection of exhibits in a neighborhood made by and for culture.

Houston, avant-garde city, offers a high quality of life

Houston attracts talent, both in the medical and in the aerospace fields, which are just the identifying values of its urban brand.

Texas Medical Center (TMC) is the largest medical center in the world and it has one of the highest densities of clinical facilities for patient care -with more than 5 million annual national visitors and 10,000 international – and research health. There is a total of 47 institutions involved in medicine, 13 hospitals and two medical schools that grouped all these facilities.

The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center was the first member of the group that makes up the TMC and it is a world reference in their fight against cancer and research.

But apart from its economic weight and health, or because of it, Houston is known worldwide and the essence of its urban brand is always accompanied by NASA.

In the collective imagination we misquote “Houston, we have a problem” enunciated by Swigert in the mission of Apollo 13 and now often used colloquially when someone is in trouble.

The city branding of this city has a unique storytelling and beyond the myth, truth of the story is that Houston served as head, hands and eyes of all projects in the US space race. Example of this golden age, and open to everyone, is now the Johnson Space Center. For over 50 years, this center has played a vital role through technological innovations and scientific discoveries.

In its early days, the center led the Gemini, Apollo and Skylab projects and currently serves as the control center for NASA operations of the International Space Station, for many advanced human exploration projects and also plays an important role in commercial crew programs of the organization.

With it, the Houston metropolitan area has become an aerospace center with its own innovation identity.

Houston shows past and future of aerospace exploration

In this context, a major attraction that Houston has now is the Space Center that emphasizes science and education in a fun way and it seeks to inspire admiration for the space explorations to the visitors.

This center is designed for all ages and it has an incredible variety of exhibitions, the world’s largest collection of moon rocks and samples of our satellite. It is, in short,  the home of Mission Control at NASA and the basis for training of astronauts that visitors can see when they discover just over Houston.

Current image of Space Center

How to create a good image, modern and contemporary, for such a spacial and special city?

As we have said, Houston has an emblem that brings together all urban facets : “City with no limits”

The mission of the Greater Houston Partnership, which is the organization that includes the Chamber of Commerce of Houston, the Houston Economic Development Council and the Houston World Trade Association, is to show as Houston the best place to live, work and do business. Houston has had an incredible growth and it is partly due to this association which has a large private investment, playing  an important role in creating jobs and maintaining a healthy environment for developing business relations.

This new brand comes from two communication agencies, the Agency MMI Houston and Avalanche Consulting of Austin. The final work embodies the pride and history of the space city, a city that has dreamers, entrepreneurs and free spirit people, and this is the reason why the “H” logo looks like a space rocket.

The city with no limits applications

This logo design can be easily modified and may represent multiple ideals and city projects.

For all these applications the web thecitywithnolimits.com helps us to see the city without limits.

Houston is an incredible city with a great future. It should not surprise us to play a key role in the United States and in the world, thanks to its technological potential. Its brand image, newly renovated, will help us to position as the technology capital of the Western world, key to be competitive in this new global era.

Bird, Parque de Antonio, Medellín

This man with his costumbrist Works makes a show of a striking, bitter criticism of some social problems. He can not be separated from their Colombian origins and his career can only be understood with the launch of his hometown of Medellín, which has also taken an important turn culturally thanks to the donation made to the Museum of Antioquia, cultural reference center in the capital of the same state and which provides to the public an exquisite selection of the artist’s work.

Currently Medellín has took a leap forward that made it a great reference city in Latin America, up to the point that it just won the Innovative City 2014 Award from The Wall Street Journal competing in the final with vanguardist towns asTel Aviv and New York.

But how a city with a reputation for dangerous urban center a few years ago get to be a reference of innovation in this decade?

We have to go back in time, to the decades of the 70’s, 80’s and 90’s to learn how dangerous was the Medellín cartel headed by Pablo Escobar, a mafia that gave a bad name to the Colombian nation unfairly and that created fears to the citizens, tourists and investors in the own city that gave it its name.

Medellín was synonymous with violence, murder and drug trafficking.

Homicide rate in Medellín

The situation has changed thanks to the infrastructure for education, culture and entertainment and new more sustainable transport systems such as Metrocables.

Medellín was the first city in the world to implement a cable car system as full-time means of public transport, in addition to using it with a social projection.

For years the local government has decided to make a complete turn around and to give Medellín an innovative added value, something that has only been possible thanks to the partnership with private institutions, enabling a hub for dialogue and development between the local government, private businesses, community organizations and universities, from the first challenges of infrastructure, through citizen participation and reaching technological modernization, the only way to make a city at the level of the challenges of the XXI century.

The main promoter of the new brand Medellín is undoubtedly Ruta N, a corporation created by the Mayor of Medellín, UNE (Strategic Business Unit) and EPM (Medellin Public Enterprises) to facilitate the economic development of the city towards intensive businesses in science, technology and innovation, in an inclusive and sustainable way. Its main objective for 2021 is to position Medellín as the most innovative city in Latin America.

The Town of the Year award is not an end, but the needed inception to progress from a local level to the consolidation of South America as an engine of development. The success of innovative Medellín was his unifying spirit that included public and private sector, citizens and institutions.

The strategy in the coming years will ensure that the media maintain Medellín in the position it has achieved thanks to the collective effort and not the violent chaos that the press labeled in the past because of an evil minority.