Best of Design:Vignelli National Park Service

In 1977, Massimo Vignelli designed a publications program for the National Park Service. Hundreds of NPS designers have used this design system to provide maps and information to visitors for over four decades.

"As everyone should know, to design a graphic program for the government implies a great deal of responsibility. The numbers involved are enormous and the impact, good or bad, is tremendous."

"The United States National Park Service administers 350 national parks––some being nature sites, some historic––with 300 million visitors per year."

"Every one of them receives a site map with park information. Books and exhibitions are also a part of the information program."

"In 1977, we designed the basic format and prototypes for all NP publications, a format which was then implemented by a very skillful staff of designers, writers, photographers, etc."

"The first thing we decided to do was standardize the size of folders into a system of folded posters that could be places in kiosks or hung in schools."

"Then we created a very flexible grid with a black identification band at the top for displaying the park name, and selected a limited range of typefaces and sizes."

"We did the same for books. Cartography, photos, and illustrations were also a vital part of the program."

"The result has been a very consistent level of quality throughout, a strong visual identity and, above all, an incredible cost reduction due to the standardization of the elements."

"Park Service Design team:
Melissa Cronyn, Nicholas Kirillof, Dennis McLaughlin, Linda Meyers, Philip Musselwhite, Mitchell Zetlin, and Vincent Gleason, Chief, Division of Publications"

Massimo Vignelli won the first Presidential Design Award in 1985 for this National Park service publications program.