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George Mason University on Thursday unveiled a redesigned logo as the capstone of its three-year-long, comprehensive rebrand.
The new look, which will include a single logo for the university and its athletics program, “asserts George Mason’s emerging identity as a national top 50 public university and Virginia’s top-ranked university for innovation and upward mobility, as well as the commonwealth’s largest, most innovative, and most diverse university,” the school said in a news release.
The “GM” monogram distinguishes the school as the world’s only university to use those initials in its logo and “recognizes that the broader community commonly refers to the university as ‘George Mason,’ not just ‘Mason’ and no longer ‘GMU,'” the release said.
The rebrand rollout began in 2021, with preparations to mark 50 years of George Mason as a university in 2022 with an updated brand narrative that “proclaims the university’s distinct approach to education as All Together Different.”
“Higher education in America is at an inflection point, with families having a harder time finding a top-quality, affordable college education at a university that will actually admit them,” said George Mason President Gregory Washington in a statement. “George Mason has always offered these things, but few families know of this value because our brand and message have not been adequately heard.
“This new look is our reintroduction to the community, and a symbol of our commitment to the fundamentals: outstanding and rigorous academics, pragmatic career preparation and internships, flexibility and value, and an atmosphere of belonging for everyone.”
George Mason has grown from a small regional college in the 1970s into the youngest institution ever to earn Carnegie Tier 1 research university status, as well as Virginia’s top-ranked university for such high-demand and varied disciplines as cybersecurity, business entrepreneurship, homeland security, criminology, and forensic sciences, the release said.
It also established Virginia’s first School of Computing in 2021 and its first College of Public Health in 2023.
The new look also fixes several operational challenges with the existing logo system, and visuals that were difficult to maintain consistently across the university’s complex academic environment. All university units will now use a single, streamlined logo system.
Input gathered from faculty and staff, students, parents, alumni, donors, and community leaders confirmed that George Mason is “All Together Different,” and in need of a new logo system to unify the community.
The new look features clean lines and open ends, symbolizing multiple entry points and pathways to success, the release said.
An interior gold shape hugged by green on both sides depicts the university’s signature diversity and inclusivity.
The clean lines represent the university’s efficiency and pragmatism, according to the release.
The familiar green and gold color palette remains, paying homage to the university’s origins, as those school colors were voted on by students in the late 1960s. However, bolder shades will be adopted to signify its confidence as a rising national leader.
“This is a new look for a new era with new expectations of American higher education,” Paul Allvin, vice president and chief brand officer at George Mason, said in a statement. “The rebrand reintroduces Mason as elite yet never elitist, prestigious yet eminently accessible, confident in blazing a fundamentally new path for public higher education in the 21st century and beyond.”
The change to the new look is planned to happen over time and is being accomplished without additional university spending.
Over the next two years, assets that can be converted at no cost, like digital displays, will be converted first, followed by branded materials that naturally run out periodically and are already budgeted for replacement.
Durable assets including external signage will be paid for by reallocation of existing budgets within the Office of University Branding.
