City of Claye-Souilly, naturally alive

Claye-Souilly is a Seine-et-Marne town with just over 12,000 inhabitants. It’s halfway between Paris, Meaux, Disneyland and Paris-Charles de Gaulle airport. It is surrounded by fields, forests and a business park. The town is renowned for its peace and quiet, its many green spaces, its village spirit, its small shops and residential areas. The municipality prides itself on offering its residents a quality of life worthy of the countryside, yet at the gateway to the Greater Paris metropolis.

As its name suggests, the town of Claye-Souilly is the result of the merger of two localities, Claye and Souilly. Two communes that today form a single entity, but which in reality remain separate, due to the Nationale 3 dual carriageway that literally cuts the town in two, Claye on one side, Souilly on the other. The previous logo emphasized this duality, with the town symbolized by an orange ribbon tied around the road. The new identity had to erase this boundary and seal this union once and for all, without forgetting to highlight the character and soul of the town.

Graphéine helped the municipality of Claye-Souilly position and redesign its visual identity.

Concept

The names “Claye” and “Souilly” share one thing in common: they both have a “y”, a descending letter, quite prominent and orally rather “lilting”.

The two communes “Claye” and “Souilly” are now one, and so are the two “y ”s! Indeed, in the new logo, the bars join to form a branch, symbolizing the link that unites the two parts of the town. The branch is adorned with leaves, evoking a bucolic setting, far from the hustle and bustle of the city, despite being at the gateway to the Greater Paris metropolis. The baseline “Naturally alive!” completes the brand promise.

More information

Context

Located at the gateway to the Brie region, Claye-Souilly offers all the advantages of a country town. Its well-preserved environment, top-quality cultural and sports facilities, dynamic shops and businesses and rich, diverse community fabric make it a pleasant town to live in. Claye-Souilly is growing and changing. Claye-Souilly is growing every day, and this growth must now be reflected in the development of a strong, unique identity. With an ever-growing population and the arrival of young families, Claye-Souilly is in the midst of a period of rapid development, and this dynamic must be accompanied by a new image to reinforce its identity within the region and illustrate this change. The town therefore wishes to modernize all its communication tools.

Challenges

The new graphic charter and logo should convey the town’s values and attractions:

• Its attractiveness, its level of facilities and services, its geographical location ;
• Its living environment and residential quality;
• Its Clayoise identity;
• Its dynamism, a range of public services with an increasingly young population, dynamic associations, year-round entertainment ;
• Its heritage: the Church, the Beuvronne River, the Ourcq Canal….