Located in the heart of Virginia, Richmond is known as one of the most historic cities in the United States. From the Native American Powhatan Tribe and Settlement, Patrick Henry’s “Give me liberty or give me death” speech, to Douglas Wilder, the first African American Governor in America, Richmond’s history is inherent to its identity. The city’s historic significance is only further complemented by its contemporary and nationally recognized museums, arts and cultural venues, beautiful landscapes, and recreational destinations.

Historical significance combined with a contemporary outlook demands a wayfinding program that not only offers navigational cues to find one’s way, but artistic gestures that embody and contribute to Richmond’s distinct character. The result of Two Twelve’s work is a comprehensive wayfinding system, both vehicular and pedestrian, that represents the diverse character of the city – unifying the city’s destinations and bridging a sense of history, place, and context, all while looking forward to the future of Richmond.

Richmond’s history of wayfinding signage is one that is layered and generational, and that has produced confusion with incongruous and inconsistent information. In response to these conditions, Two Twelve conducted an assessment of the multiple previously developed wayfinding programs, which revealed the need for a new, cohesive system that could be strategically implemented, easily maintained, updated, and expanded as city budgets allowed.

From its assessment, Two Twelve defined the hierarchy of information needs and developed user experience journeys in coordination with Richmond’s City Planning team and stakeholders to develop a layered color palette to support the user experience.

What proved a more challenging aspect was highlighting the neighborhood areas beyond color – what would give each destination an individual identity? What can pay homage to the city’s historic character? To capture the city’s history, but also to ensure a versatile vernacular, Two Twelve used contextual architectural photography for timeless storytelling – evoking the history of the place and bringing it to life in the present-day.

In close collaboration with local photographer Ansel Olsen, the photographic medium further heightened the sense of Richmond’s history while providing memorable cues within each sign. While the challenge of visual storytelling is the potential for it to feel obsolete over time, Two Twelve’s design considerations at the onset to surmount this was the careful selection of photographs with a dynamic tonality – establishing an everlasting connection between past and present.

Extending the wayfinding strategy and logic, Two Twelve worked with the Richmond Region Tourism to update their regional and downtown maps to coordinate with the wayfinding effort and amplify the mental map of Richmond.