“Imagine you were granted the magic power to change any website in the whole world-wide web…. Which one would you pick?”

Says at the beginning of the introductory text by NEW!, a creative agency from Vilnius, Lithuania, who took the initiative to rethink the largest online knowledge database  - Wikipedia.

They’ve started with the thought that both from a designer’s and user’s point of view Wikipedia could be improved, and yes, I agree. It was aesthetically boring – the whole site had the early 2000s kind of look, with a really, really outdated brand logo. That would be enough of a starting point for me, but the guys from NEW! noticed some functional flaws, as well. Although I am a regular Wikipedia visitor, I’ve never went further than reading articles Google search came up with, so if they say there are flaws in the functionality of the website, I assume they’re right. Below is the result of two spring months of work, according to NEW!, but for an insight into the whole process visit the dedicated Wikipedia Redefined website.

Photos: NEW!

Personally, I find this project very close to me, although I haven’t contributed to it in any way. It’s probably more about the whole idea of noticing brands in our surroundings that need improvement, and thinking about possible ways of making them better looking, more functional, etc. Unfortunately, imagination often diverges from reality, and initiatives like this stay on the conceptual level – they never reach the key people who could make them happen. In fact, there already was an independent project for rebranding Wikipedia done in collaboration between ViewPoint Magazine and the MovingBrands branding agency, which also, needless to say, wasn’t brought to life, although it had an outstanding end result.