Hildegard Brinkel, Claudia Brendler
Anhalt University of Applied Sciences

Guidance System for Visitors of the City of Magdeburg

Biography: Hildegard Brinkel was born in Dresden, Germany, in 1981. Since October 2000, she has been studying at the department of design and visual communication at the Anhalt University of Applied Sciences in Dessau, Germany. Last year she did an internship with atelier doppelpunkt Kommunikationsdesign in Berlin, Germany.

From October 2004 until January 2005, she participated in a project called “Guidance system for visitors of the city of Magdeburg.” The project was produced in cooperation with municipal authorities of Magdeburg who plan to utilize this design. This project was also featured in an exhibition and was awarded first prize.

Objective: This entry was designed to provide a way-finding system for the old district of the city of Magdeburg, Germany. The city is divided into three geographical core areas in which most points of interest are located. The system allows people to find their way within one area and to move easily between it and the other two. Each area is assigned an icon and a silhouette based on landmarks such as the cathedral, the horse rider, and the Elbe River. System components include an overview with a map, intermediate guides directing people to the core areas, area guides for points of interest situated in a particular core area, and destination guides with detailed information about a landmark.

Tools used: The layout of the media was done in Adobe® InDesign®. The documents were created to match the actual scale, with elements placed on different layers. The images to be used for the destination guides were edited using Adobe Photoshop®. The result is graphics depicting the points of interest with a rasterized appearance.