We’ve known for a almost a year now that the New York Islanders will be relocating to Brooklyn’s Barclays Center for 2015/16 but what hasn’t been so clear is what their branding plans would be once the move took place. Well, thanks to a very informative piece in New York Magazine last week we’ve got a much better, and nerve calming (for the traditionalists, anyways) sense of what’s to come.
The name is staying the same.
The colours are staying the same.
The uniforms… “mostly” staying the same.
Apparently the home and road set will get nothing more than a shoulder patch which plays up the fact they’re in Brooklyn… probably a blue and orange Brooklyn Bridge or something.
So, that’s good news right? No worries about the Brooklyn Islanders trotting out there in black and white uniforms with “BROOKLYN” arched across the front in Futura or some other thin sans-serif font. Well, at least not to the home and road set…
“[Our new alternate uniform] is where we’re gonna get a little creative, that is where we will speak to Brooklyn in an authentic way. My job is to work with (team owner) Charles (Wang) and to make sure we stay true to the hard-core fan, the fan that has been there from day one. But at the same time, we also want to reach out and connect with the new fan, and we’re going to do it in an appropriate way.” — Barclays Center CEO Brett Yormark
So, yeah, I can envision the process now…
“We need to keep blue and orange to keep our old fans happy but we also need to reach out to our new home so it’s gotta have black and white and use that Brooklyn Nets style of simplicity”
Behold!
C’mon, you could so see this happening.
The Islanders are actually getting a preview of what life in Brooklyn could be like when they host the New Jersey Devils at their new home for a pre-season game this Saturday. Islanders Stanley Cup banners are in the rafters, the ice is painted, and the team has sewn commemorative patches to their jerseys.
One of the big concerns about a hockey team at Barclays Center was that the arena wasn’t really built with hockey in mind leaving the seating a little unconventional for a NHL team in the 21st century. Joe DeLessio’s piece in New York Magazine also gave us a few shots of what that looks like.
You can see more pics of this problem and details of the solutions the Islanders are kicking around in his article.
The plan is that the New York Islanders will still play out of the Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum (one of the three non-sponsored arena names left in the NHL) on Long Island through the end of the 2014/15 season before heading west to the Barclays Center for opening night of the 2015/16 season.
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