City Council Approves New Tagline, Logo

“Amazing City. Since 1925.”

That’s the tagline the Temple Terrace City Council approved Tuesday to promote the city in its . It also approved a logo that depicts Temple Terrace’s iconic two “T’s” on a crest with Mediterranean Revival-style scrolls and the words “City of Temple Terrace.”

“I love that logo,” said Temple Terrace Mayor Joe Affronti.

The city’s partners in the project, Tim Lancaster of Lancaster Design and Margie Martin of Martin Communications, have been working since October to identify the tagline and logo, the first step in developing a fresh image for the city. They conducted research, interviews and to determine how to best promote the city.

“Two audiences emerged,” Martin said. “There’s people that obviously live here and love Temple Terrace and know so much about it and are just big fans and love to talk about what’s so wonderful about the community. And then there’s the second audience, which is the outsiders looking in and people that don’t know about Temple Terrace.”

Martin said they also found that there are many attributes that people love about the community, including: ; ; ; ; ; ; and proximity to , entertainment and .

People here want other people to know that Temple Terrace is a city, which is beneficial to economic development and residents, Martin said.

Three themes were consistently repeated: “amazing” amenities and lifestyle; benefits of being a city; and rich history with established sense of an authentic community.

Martin said the team thought the word “amazing” should be included in the tagline, and presented the statement, “Amazing. Since 1925.”

“The one word that we kept coming back to that we thought really synthesized everything was something that’s completely inclusive like the word ‘amazing,’” she said.

Affronti suggested that the word “city” be added to the tagline in case it is displayed separately from the logo.

“I just think that maybe that gives us a better identity as a city,” he said.

In designing the logo, Lancaster said four elements kept coming up: the Hillsborough River; the ; trees; and the Mediterranean Revival architecture.

But creating a logo with all four features would have been difficult, he said. So, he focused primarily on the architecture aspect.

“The Mediterranean Revival architecture is, in my mind, the foundation of the city’s identity, and that’s being reinforced with the that are being built, with the new redevelopment, the civic park,” Lancaster said.

The two “T’s” in the design look exactly like the ones that were on the city gates in the 1920s, Lancaster explained. And the “T’s” are already being used in the and on the Temple Terrace Preservation Society’s new car sticker.

“We think the logo and the tagline provides that platform and that foundation that would have a lot of legs to pursue a lot of different marketing campaign angles,” he said.

“It’s a platform that we think is suitable for storytelling,” Martin added. “And that’s very critical, and we’re going to be able to tell a story from a very strong position, a position of strength and history and heritage.”

The next steps will be to use the tagline and logo in the city’s new website, ad campaigns, brochures and signage.

Mike Dunn, the city’s public information officer, said the team is scheduled to begin discussion on the new website design in the next few days.