2044 Olympic Logo Project: Havana, Cuba

6 min readFeb 24, 2021

Designing a campaign logo for the Summer Olympics in Havana, Cuba

Havana Cuba

Havana is the capital city, largest city, province, major port, and leading commercial center of Cuba. The city has a population of 2.1 million inhabitants,[5][4] and it spans a total of 781.58 km2 (301.77 sq mi) — making it the largest city by area, the most populous city, and the fourth largest metropolitan area in the Caribbean region.

What Cuba is Known for:

Notable People from Havana

Celia Cruz

Camila Cabello

Jose Canseco

José Canseco Capas Jr. is a Cuban-American former Major League Baseball outfielder and designated hitter. During his time with the Oakland Athletics, he established himself as one of the premier power hitters in the game. He won the Rookie of the Year, and Most Valuable Player award, and was a six-time All-Star.

Daisy Fuentes

Popular Sports in Cuba / Havana

Cuba’s Olympic History

Cuba has sent athletes to the Summer Olympic Games since 1900, but never participated in the Winter Games. They have won over 200 medals, with their best results from the 1992 Barcelona Games where they took home 31 medals, 14 of which were gold medals. Their best performing event is boxing followed by athletics.

Cuba is the most successful country that has participated in the Summer Olympics without ever attending the Winter Games. They are also the fifth highest number of medals among the countries who have never hosted the Olympic Games.

Cuba is one of the perennial powerhouses in the Summer Games for many reasons. They are one of the few countries that won not only an Olympic medal but a gold medal in their first year of participation.

Cuba first showed up in the Summer Games in 1900 by sending fencer Ramón Fonst to Paris, France. Fonst won a silver medal in men’s masters épée and the gold for men’s épée. He singlehandedly put Cuba on the map by making Olympic history by winning the gold in their very first Olympic outing. Cuba was ranked 12th from a total of 24 countries that participated that year with just one athlete.

The Cuban delegation to the 1904 Summer Games were completely made of fencers. Ramón Fonst returned to the Summer Games again winning two Olympic medals, this time both gold ones for men’s épée and men’s foil. Albertson Van Zo Post took the gold for men’s singlestick, the silver for men’s foil, and the bronze for both men’s épée and men’s sabre. Manuel Díaz won the gold for men’s sabre. Charles Tatham won the men’s épée and bronze for men’s foil. The 1904 Olympic team was the best that Cuba has ever had so far. The four man team scored a total of nine medals placing Cuba on the third spot overall that year.

Cuba missed a total of seven Summer Games so far (1908, 1912, 1920, 1932, 1936, 1984 and 1988) due to various reasons. But when they are able to send a delegation to the Olympics, they often manage to make an impact. Since their debut in 1900, Cuban athletes have managed to win Olympic medals except for a handful of times. With such a success in the Summer Games, some might be surprised to know that Cuba has never participated in the Winter Games.

Food in Havana

Architecture in Havana

Havana’s classic and most prevalent architectural styles are baroque and neoclassicism. Baroque designers began sharpening their quills in the 1750s; neoclassicism gained the ascendancy in the 1820s and continued, amid numerous revivals, until the 1920s.

Landscape

Rolling Hills | Mountains | Country Side | Coasts | Beaches

Word Map

Mood board

Thumbnails

Digital Thumbnails

Final Logo Presentation

Rationale

For this assignment, we were assigned a city to host an olympic game, either summer or winter, over twenty years in the future. With a goal to present both your city and the olympics, in a manner that could withstand the test of time. I began research on my host city, Havana, Cuba, by researching everything I could about the area. Certain features stuck out to me, such as the bright, popping architecture and classic cars. I learned that due to trade holds Cuba experienced because of the political climate, the country itself became like a time capsule to products created in and before the 50s. Because of this concept of preserved times, I decided to base my olympic logo design around some of the older buildings Havana has, as they are constantly being renovated and repainted while preserving the old architecture, it is in my opinion the perfect mix of new and old. For my Logo, I tied in the olympic representation into the building logo by making the arched structures appear as the podiums the winners would be standing on. I placed the typography atop these pedestals, but made careful effort not to place havana on the winner’s podium to avoid a logo that appeared over confident unintentionally. I kept a saturated color palette to match both the color of the buildings, and the theme of the summer olympics and landscape Cuba has to offer. Overall I feel this logo was a successful representation of an Olympic bid logo for Havana, Cuba.