Archdiocese of New York

Design Intervention

  • Identity
  • Brand Language
  • Brand Architecture
Archdiocese of New York image
The Challenge

Misalignment. Missed Ministry

The Archdiocese of New York (ADNY) serves approximately three million New Yorkers in 10 county districts. The Archdiocese has many ministries and offices providing education, programming, events and resources to serve the needs of this vibrant and diverse population. As is often the case, each ministry and office was inadvertently eroding their connection to the ADNY as each was visually expressing their offerings in their own unique style. This visual misalignment created confusion, clutter and unfortunately made it difficult for New Yorkers to clearly see and participate in all that the Archdiocese had to offer.

The Solution

One for the Many

To realign the visual presentation of these ministries and offices, we found our inspiration in the heritage of this faith’s universal and iconic symbol, the Archdioceses’ coat-of-arms. This symbol, recognized by parishioners all over New York provided an instant connection point. By leveraging the equity of the ADNY masterbrand, we brought recognition to the many ministries and offices and in-turn, created a more keen awareness of all that the ADNY has to offer. Ultimately, this connection brought strength and credibility to the multiple ministries while helping to advance the ADNY’s mission to serve the spiritual and material needs of the local area and of the world.

The Approach

Many Paths, One Journey

The ADNY created their ministries and offices to help people through life’s spiritual journey. From youth faith formation to understanding and revering cultural diversity, from campus ministries to navigating family life...the list goes on and on. All these ministries, programs and resources uniquely crafted to serve New Yorkers’ spiritual needs. Our design approach was to artfully reveal the ADNY’s heartfelt understanding of life’s inflection points.

In Conclusion

“We presented a complicated scenario to Duffy: 11 departments that had all been creating their own logos and color schemes for years. Making changes required input from not just a few people, but from all 11 department heads plus top-level managers. Somehow, Duffy synthesized all the information thrown at them and created a new, elegant, streamlined, beautiful identity system that we could not be happier with.”

Bridget Cusick
Director of Marketing, Archdiocese of New York