TCS New York City Marathon

One of the top running events in the world, and the largest and most beloved marathon, the TCS New York City Marathon is an annual citywide celebration of achievement and tenacity that brings over 50,000 athletes and nearly two million spectators to the streets of the city. The running course crosses five bridges, touching all five boroughs of New York, winding its way through street parties and neighborhoods, to the finish line 26.2 miles later in the heart of Central Park.

Owned and operated by the nonprofit organization, New York Road Runners, the New York City Marathon today is sponsored by Tata Consulting Services (TCS), the IT services and consulting subsidiary of the Tata Group, which sponsors many running events around the world. A key goal of this redesign project was creating a powerful and independent brand asset for the New York City Marathon while strengthening the association with its principal sponsor.

The core concept of the new TCS New York City Marathon visual identity is New York City’s great icon, Lady Liberty, raising a fiery beacon to welcome the world. Lady Liberty is represented by the crown and the torch, enthroned on the New York City streets where the runners and crowds gather and celebrate. Five bold stripes converging into the figure represent the five boroughs of the city through which the marathon route always runs. The vivid orange hue invokes the passion and inspiration of the event and, in combination with the navy blue, recalls the colors of the New York City flag.

Symbol

The design update features a dynamic and streamlined silhouette in which the various elements are rendered in the same graphic language, holding together as a singular brand image. The icon is now distilled to its essence, optimized for reducibility, digital reproductions, and embroidery.

Wordmark

The marathon’s name is set in a modern all-caps font, incorporating the TCS trademark and arranged in three lines, allowing for a consistent typographic approach across both vertical and horizontal lockups. The harmonious combination of a distict wordmark that also encapsulates the title sponsor’s own logo with a strong new marathon symbol was one of the key challenges of this design assignment.

An event of this scale requires a complex set of brand guidelines to help partners, sponsors, manufacturers, and retailers stay consistent. We created an extensive identity system for the Marathon, including a variety of logo lockups, guidance on how to represent special programs and events, rules for representing various levels of sponsorship and partnership, patterns, graphic elements, merchandise items, and pictograms for everything from route signage to hydration stations for thousands of international runners.