2010

VANCOUVER WINTER OLYMPIC AND PARALYMPIC GAMES 

Can we create Nordic trail maps for athletes
and trainers that are easily digestible and withstand the elements?

Role

Designer

Team

Designer
Map Specialist
Art Director

Responsibilities

Map design and layout
Oversight of Printing

Overview

I was a contract designer for the Olympic creative team during 2009/2010 in Vancouver. During that time I worked on various projects including a set of Nordic trail maps for athletes and trainers. As with all the projects I worked on, this project followed the established Vancouver 2010 style guide for all of the main branding but maintained its own unique look through the actual map designs as well as the modularity of the branding.

Goals

Product Goals

1. The maps needed to be legible both when folded up and when pinned on a ski hut wall for reference.
2. The maps needed to survive all type of weather conditions including extreme cold and precipitation.
3. The key information needed to be easily viewed when the map was folded various ways.
4. The design solution must follow the Vancouver 2010 style guide but also adhere to established mapping standards.

Original Map

We received the maps from a local Canadian landscape architect in raw PDF format. I received 25 trail maps and 26 stadium maps. As the maps required a lot of work I chose one map to test with internal stakeholders before applying the solution to the rest.

Below is the map I used as a test in its original format.

Test

The first iteration consisted of reducing as much of the visual noise as possible and applying the basic VANOC branding. Some questions that arose from this exercise were:

1. Is the colour of the trail significant?
2. Can the supporting elements (legend, course information and chart) be reshuffled?
3. Can the two sets of three line course information be consolidated into a single stack?
4. Can the hierarchy of the second stack be revised?

After talking with internal stakeholders from the cross-country and biathlon divisions, they confirmed that trail colours did have significance but that we were able to select colours from new the VANOC colour palette. Other elements were able to be rearranged accordingly.

Once we had settled on the design solution we conferred with the wayfinding department as ground signage needed to be updated to match.

Final Solution

The final design was then applied to all 51 maps, with key decisions are outlined below:

• The legend was removed from individual maps. It was instead, placed on the back cover of the spread to act as a legend for all maps. 
• Elevations were stacked allowing better legibility of the elevation chart.
• Colors from the VANOC palette were chosen for each course.
• The overall design was tweaked to maximise legibility and functionality.

Map Spread

Each map was placed onto a larger spread. In all there were four spreads, trail maps on one side and stadium maps on the other. Numerous paper prototypes were made to ensure maps and data were carefully placed to reduce the amount of information crossing fold lines where possible.

VANOC branding and illustration was applied.

Conclusion

The maps were well received by athletes and trainers. I heard second hand that they worked well on and off the track, whether folded or pinned to a ski hut wall. As with a lot of the Olympic branding, the maps became a collector's piece after the games concluded.