Jan. 15—Spanish flamenco singer and guitarist Juan José Alba recently released a single titled "Santa Fe Style," accompanied by a music video filmed at Diablo Canyon Recreation Area.
But what actually constitutes Santa Fe style?
When it comes to city government, there's now an official answer.
The city of Santa Fe's communications department has created an internal style guide, with the goal of making city government's branding more consistent across its many departments and more identifiable for the public.
The effort includes a more selective use of the city's official seal for items like governmental proclamations and communications, with a simplified shield icon employed for other uses, such as social media profile pictures, trash receptacles and city vehicles.
"This way, we make sure the seal is always used the best way it should be," said communications manager Michaela Beggins.
The ultimate goal of brand standardization is to build trust and foster confidence in city government, according to the new style guide.
Beggins said the communications team has wanted to create a style guide for a long time, which to her knowledge the city has not had before. She emphasized the effort is not a rebrand, but an attempt to cut down on the "huge array of logos" on display across different city departments and divisions.
"We aren't doing away with anything, just trying to build consistency," she said.
The 19-page document, publicly available on the city's communications web page, details guidelines for how the city's logos should be displayed and formatted, including exceptions and variations.
Along with the city logos it includes information about the city's typefaces and its brand colors — gray, gold, blue and red — which Beggins said are drawn from elements of Santa Fe's natural landscape.
The city's primary logo, one familiar to longtime Santa Feans, features a shield in the center of the city's seal with the words "City of Santa Fe."
The seal draws on a number of historic elements from the city's colonial past, including the original Spanish founding name of the city: "La Villa Real de la Santa Fé de San Francisco de Asís."
The shield in the center of the seal includes elements of the flags of the three countries that have claimed ownership of the city: Spain, Mexico and the United States. Below, it lists the years the three countries took control: 1610 (Spain), 1821 (Mexico) and 1846 (United States).
One group that goes unmentioned are the Indigenous Tewa communities, which are believed to have resided in and around Santa Fe since roughly the year 900.