CANADIAN BROADCASTING SYSTEM
GRAPHIC STANDARDS MANUAL
Société Radio-Canada Manuel des normes graphiques
Burton Kramer Associates Ltd.
Ottawa, ON: CBC Public Relations Office, 1974. Original edition. Parallel text in French and English. Five color screen printed [white plus PMS 130, 151, 165, 179] three ring binder. 13 tabbed sections. 146 [vii] pp. printed rectos only. Expected trivial wear to the exposed tabs, and lower binding ring with a .32-inch [8mm] gap between clamps, otherwise a fine fresh example.
11 x 12-inch decorated three ring binder housing seven pages of frontis material followed by 146 pages divided into thirteen tabbed sections. From the introduction: “Consciously or carelessly, every organization has a visual identity. It is affected by its communications, products, programs, promotion, signs, advertising, buildings, offices, and other work space, vehicles, stationery, by the look and style of everything done by or associated with the organization . . .”
“The successful implementation of the identification program requires a consistent approach to graphic design. To be effective, the program must have an organized and controlled system to govern proper and consistent adherence to the graphic design and style of the identification program and to maintain an agreed-upon quality and approach to application . . .”
“This graphic standards manual has been prepared to help all of us make the best possible use of our new symbol and style. It sets forth the CBC’s policy and standards on corporate identification and describes and illustrates as clearly as possible the basic design elements and applications of the identity program . . .”
Tabbed contents:
- Symbol: 11 leaves “The symbol of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation has been developed as a visual representation of all aspects of broadcasting. It is active and outgoing and functions as a strong visual target, attracting and holding the attention of viewers. It is suite ideally to development in animated form for on-air use. It is easily adaptable to all required forms of reproduction techniques.”
- Symbol and Logotype: 9 leaves
- Typography: 7 leaves “The typeface selected for Corporate use is Helvetica Medium, one of the best known and most pleasing of the modern sanserif letter forms.”
- Grid Systems: 9 leaves
- Color: 6 leaves and 12 Pantone sheets
- Stationery and Forms: 37 leaves
- Television and Radio: 6 leaves
- Vehicles: 10 leaves
- Signs: 10 leaves
- Radio Canada International: 9 leaves
- Advertising: 5 leaves
- Miscellaneous: 4 leaves
- Addenda, including Flow Chart, Glossary, Reorder Form, and Control: 13 leaves
- Frontis material includes Letter from the President, Introduction, Policy on Identification, Official languages at the CBC
In 1974 Canada’s public broadcaster, the CBC, adopted a new logo designed by Burton Kramer. That logo, affectionately referred to as “the gem,” would become one of Canada’s most recognized corporate images, leaving an indelible mark on both Canadian culture and national identity. From the Graphics Standards Manual: “The symbol evolves from the letter “C”, for Canada as the visual core of the broadcasting source. It emphasizes visually that the national service, owned by the people of Canada, represents the primary element in the Canadian Broadcasting system.
“The symbol is globular in shape, conveying a sense of the CBC’s International responsibilities as well as the obligations of its mandate from the people of Canada. Visually the symbol grows outward from a strorng central core and lightens in tone and density as it expands and radiates to the perimeter.”
The 1974 logo was retired in 1992. The redesign replaced Kramer’s letter ‘C,’ with a circle. He criticized the new design’s cultural separation, “They have this thing, which I don’t see as Canada’s broadcasting symbol. I could see it as symbol for something else, but there is nothing specific that references Canada. That was the biggest problem.”
Steven Heller wrote “Before corporations, entertainment companies, sports franchises, and political parties acquired “brand narratives,” the notion of branding was a subset of a practice called “corporate identity.” CI, as it was known, required companies and design firms to develop, refine, and maintain an integrated identity system defined by laws set down in a bible known as the graphic standards manual.
“This gospel according to the design-creator was handed down to supplicant designers whose job, like scribes of old, was to precisely apply the logos, adhere to the corporate color and typographic palettes, and follow the formats without diverging even a fraction from the established guidelines. For designers and collectors of graphic design, some of these manuals—including ones for IBM, Lufthansa, the New York Subway System, and NASA—are sacred texts, revered for how they help shift graphic design from simply an intuitive practice to a rigorously strategic one.
“Nonetheless, manuals are ephemeral, and many were simply discarded when identities changed or businesses merged or closed.”
“[Burton] Kramer was one of Canada’s first graphic designers to courageously promote integrated design at a time when such an approach was virtually unknown in Canada. He contributed to introduce the use of Helvetica, typographic grid, and abstract symbols,” — Roger R. Remington, 2008
Burton Kramer [New York City, 1932 – ] is one of the pioneers of Canadian graphic design. He studied at the Institute of Design in Chicago before finding his way to New Haven and the Yale School of Arts and Architecture, where he studied under Alexey Brodovitch, Bradbury Thompson, Herbert Matter, Josef Albers, and Paul Rand. He left Yale for one year and moved to the Royal College of Art in London as a Fulbright Scholar. He finally graduated from Yale in 1957 with MFA degree in graphic design.
At Yale, he built his educational background by learning from some of the greatest professors of Modernism and he found the opportunity to take part in Paul Rand’s courses. Kramer said, “I learned a particular attitude from him. How do you make decisions? How do you approach doing things? What would you do? How would you characterize that? What would you say? Well, he was the first teacher I’d ever had.” He continued, “You have to have a reason for everything you do. If you showed him something good he would say, ‘why did you do that?’”
The same year he started to work at Will Burton Office in New York City, and then became assistant art director of Architectural Record magazine and New York Life Insurance Company. In 1960 he began working at the American headquarters of the worldwide famous swiss company Geigy Chemical Corp. After two years, he moved to Zurich to work as chief designer at Erwin Halpern Advertising and the work he did there received the Swiss Poster Award and the Swiss Packaging Award. He also became the first foreign-member invited to join the VSG—Verbande Schweizer Grafiker (Swiss Graphic Designers Association).
In 1965 he moved to Toronto, Canada to work as art director for Paul Arthur & Associates—then one of Canada’s best-known design agencies—on maps and signage for Expo 67. Two years later he established Burton Kramer & Associated Ltd., focusing on corporate identity design. He served major institutions such as the OECA (Ontario Educational Communications Authority), Radio Canada International, and the ROM (Royal Ontario Museum).
Massimo Vignelli believes that the best examples of graphic design in Canada are from the sixties, so it is no exaggeration to call these years the ‘Golden age of design.’ Kramer’s professional life entered a new stage following his move to Toronto in 1965. He designed the Expo 67 signage system, the visual identities for the Royal Ontario Museum and the Ontario Educational Television in parallel with launching the Kramer Design Associates. R. Roger Remington wrote of him: “even though ‘corporate identity’ was very much in the air in the 1960’s, Kramer, possibly because of his unique background with Will Burtin, Geigy and Halpern, was a highly visible pioneer in this kind of work in Canada.”
In 1974, after became a Canadian citizen, he designed the corporate identity for CBC (Canadian Broadcasting Corporation) that included mark, printed matter, signage, stationery, uniforms, and graphic standards manual. The same year he was accepted as one of the first Canadian members of AGI — Alliance Graphique Internationale.
Kramer expanded his professional career to creating the comprehensive visual identity strategy of CBC, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. At that time, there were about twenty-six CBC stations in Toronto, which proves the importance of developing this logo as the core of the visual identity. The company logo was placed in the corner of the television programs and a supporting audio recording announced, “This is CBC.” From 1980 to 2001 he taught corporate design and typography at the Ontario College of Art & Design, and also lectured in Mexico and the U.S.A. Since 2010 the Kramer Design Archive is part of the Modernist Designers Section at the Vignelli Center for Design Studies in Rochester, while a complete archive of his graphic design career is housed in the permanent collection of the ROM (Royal Ontario Museum), Toronto.