Case Study: MoN creates a bold new museum brand with Pentagram

MoN launches a century-long brand system with Pentagram

MoN, a new cultural destination in Tokyo, sought to establish a brand identity for its radical vision of a participatory museum where culture is a living, evolving narrative. The challenge for vendor Pentagram was to create a name and identity system that could hold an enormous range of cultural programming without flattening it, while also working bilingually for Japanese and international audiences.

Pentagram developed the strategic idea of "dimensional time," which was expressed through a unique visual identity featuring a spiral logo that contains the M-O-N acronym. This system, which includes a complementary linear bar and a bilingual typographic approach, implies that all stories are ongoing. The resulting name, MoN, functions dually in Japanese and English, meaning "gate" and "Museum of Narratives," perfectly capturing the institution's role as a gateway for shared cultural stories.

MoN