Branding Karachi
Smothered in an age of symbols, icons, logos and brands, and being a designer,
branding cities is the next big thing to do. We have Islamabad the Beautiful (and the Dead)
and we have Lahore, Our Cultural Melting Pot. What about Karachi? We want a title too!
quite a shame to read this. there is sooo much to Karachi that one particular title will do no justice.
And by giving it a title u will simply be stereotyping it.
sad.
karachi: doesnt the name say it all?
yes indeed.i call it my beloved Apocalyptic City.
ride the lightening , you.
love as always
Vader, the Dark Sith
I agree with Anathema..Karachi has so many facets, we cant really put it in one title.
City of Billboards
jeez- for the sake of a creative exercise, this question was put fwd. what facet of karachi defines it? the spirit of survival? the medley of cultures? its cosmopolitan nature.
this isnt about boxing (sorry all those narrow minded people out there) this is about branding. get up consumers. this is the biggest brand there is!!
for me its the smog and the stifling weather . beggars are a distant third. ( may be its bcause some of em make more money than i do ).
love as always
Vader, the Dark Sith
biggest brand and giving an identity.
that’s like putting a price to someting terribly priceless.
sorry for being “narrow minded” but really… some people have been into marketing too long to forget sometings dont need a “brand?”
We were the “city of lights”, but given the present situation, how abt the “city of blackouts”
well karachi is known as de city of lights n da city dat never sleeps… it has already been given dese titles …
Concerned:well as u said dat given the present situation, how abt the “city of blackouts”
well i know dat now a days we gat electic prob but it doz not meanz dat we should name our city a city of blackouts ….couz no matter what so ever happens its still our city…n the peoples dat should b blame r doz KSE peoples and our GOVT we gat lods of sources from which they could create electric city like water … but they dun want to do anything …
Sizzling, Karachi.
Cuz our city is actually sizzling, people running here and there, Life on the run, trading lights, food, cars, Shopping, weddings, concerts, Gossips, controversies …. with all the odds, with all the blood shed we never stop, we keep on going, with our sprits high, we keep sizzlin’ .
maybe the city with people that need to lighten up. this is, i repeat, an exercise in creativity- just to sound out how all of us perceive something common between us so differently. all over the world, major cities are being branded for the sheer pleasure of design- of taking fun in giving something a look, a feel, a tangibility. thats all.
jamash- i love the word sizzling. our city is sizzlin’!! city of blackouts and billboards…heheh. also city under construction!
its all part of Karachi in the 2000’s!
I feel creative right now and wrote this haiku about Karachi and billboards:
If billboards were leaves
fall season in Karachi
Many injuries
beauty ??? culture???? lights??
come on KARACHI IS LIFE !!!!!
beauty ??? culture???? lights??
come on KARACHI IS LIFE !!!!!
the city of life- i liiike!
now im tempted to start designing a logo for this!! wonder what colour karachi would be? RED??
good stuff OA – actually brilliant – billboards fit in nicely with the Kigo of your haiku. nicely done i say.
DV-
Thanks DV,
Peace, love and ten silver drops :)
karatshi (as arabic does not have a ch) – city of fire
@Kashif: What kind of whack comment is that? That’s why Arabic is not our official language. I mean .. no one is calling our city Kaghachi (as french does not have a ‘r’). I don’t understand the relevance of your comment at all.
Coming back to the topic at hand, I actually feel ‘Cultural Melting Pot’ applies more to Karachi — we definitely have more ethnicities and more number of languages spoken here than in Lahore which is actually quite homgenous ethnically: It’s just Punjabis — Karachi has so many more different cultures: all four provinces as well as Afghanis and Indian immigrants from central India as well as Gujarat — it’s definitely a lot more diverse than any other city in Pakistan.
And how could I forget our brethren from eastern India (the Biharis) and East Pakistan (the Bengalis). Show me Bengalis and Biharis in Lahore.
Keeping pathan bhais and their infinite chai khokas/dhabbas/makai thelas in karachi.
Karachi:Where pathans become entrepreneurs.
How about’Karachi – The Entrepreneurial City’ – where ever Pakistani wants to come to make a decent living.
Karachi – Waves breaking up onto my horizons!
How About:
“Karachi IS Pakistan”
How could I forget all those ‘Karachi rocks’ posts? So here we go ‘Karachi – the city that rocks’
I think a few of you have hit the nail head with your suggestions. Here are a few attributes that I associate with Karachi.
I find Karachi to be the city thats coming out of an unusual and uncertain time. The violence is slowly toning down and the city is all set to regain the glory that it once commanded in 60s and 70s.
In that respect I find to be like a phoenix rising from the ashes.
Karachi also happens to be the most welcoming city. Like Insiya mentioned her post prior to this one, its a place that you would like to hug. The great part is that its also a place that if hugged, hugs you back. It embraces everyone. In that respect its has a motherly nature.
At the same time, we can never overlook the importance it has to the country. If Lahore is the heart of Pakistan then Karachi is easily the Jugular.
So I close my eyes and think about Karachi. I see a mature beautiful woman, who is the ultimate combination of beatuy with breains. She has her shortcomings but yet so captivating that you cant help falling in love with her. Her eyes reflect the experiences that she has seen and her smile reflects her determination to contiune progressing despite what comes her way. Her candor is her elegance and her gusto is her mystique. She has many that adore and admire her, many that loathe and despise her and many who want to use her. And for someone as diverese, all encompassing and universalistic as Karachi the only colour I can see is White.
Thats what I think of my – our, Karachi, a city of raw emotions, colorful history and glorious future.
how about KARACHI KALASHNIKOV or KARACHI 420
How Abt KARACHI THE COURAGEOUS
I kept thinking about all the comments of this post on way back from work and I realized that all that was said here is what makes Karachi, Karachi. Its as essential to the city as wind or water. Much like the city itself that is quite essential to the people that inhabit it as well the general population the country.
I thus felt that it wont be an exaggeration to call Karachi The Essential City!
Lahore by no means is the cultural melting pot. It may be the cultural CAPITAL of Pakistan, but the true Cultural Melting Pot is most definitely Karachi. You can find any and all Pakistani cultures here with equal ease.
The City of Lights is an old title and is obsolete, I am pretty sure there are other cities in the world that have a lot more light output (eg. Tokyo). Also it doesnt describe Karachi well.
I would go for Karachi – The Buisness Hub of Pakistan, or Karachi – The Melting Pot of Pakistan or something of that sort.
I vote for Umair’s title: City of Life. Very apt. And Jammie – how about you design the logo and blog it so that we all can see it. And maybe other designers visiting this blog can send their enteries too and we can take the excersie to the next level. Don’t you think? :)
Amazing Karachi!
city of lights and the city that never sleeps are already there… i was thinking city of survivors since we have been surviving all the ups and downs for eternity
Mini Paksitan….
Karachi – the city of smiles!!!
like i always say;
“Karachi my High
Karachi my Low
To Karachi i must go”
and how come all the suggestions are in english?
get a lil desi why dont we?
like that all too famous line
“zara hut kay zara buch kay
yeh hai mumbai meri jaan”
was such a perfect way to ‘brand’/describe mumbai.
lemme go put my thinking cap on.
The slogan for Karachi should be ” YOU CAN’T STRIKE ME DOWN”
“Mohajiristan” seems most appropriate, or beter yet “Cockroachistan”.
Jammie..we are not students of your class nor part of any survey.So lighten up before you call us narrow minded.
i wont even deem a response to that one-
everyone who has answered in the spirit of conversation and this exercise thank you.
this was not a survey or “part of my class” although i have brought this up in my class and received answers much maturer than the one above.
this was asked with the intent of getting everyone to start talking about something that we all think about and live everyday- i have received amazing answers here on metblogs and otherwise and frankly, the very fact that we are even botering to discuss it means my point is made. thanks everyone.
Although I like the effort you are making.
I don’t agree with the unnecessary criticism you are lashing out to the commenters.
Maybe Metblog should set an age limit above yours in the spirit of better authorship.
And God help your students.
So wrote the original author:
“….this is about branding. get up consumers. this is the biggest brand there is!!…”
ironical isnt it …. it started with some weird exercise in BRANDING karachi, so that we can all come up with catchy and cute labels that we could put up on T-shirts or compartmentalize a city of 16million souls in some ‘consumerist’ label …. tch… tch …. and now its ended up with the original author being overly defensive and lashing out at anyone and everyone else who didnt agree with her ……
karachi defies all labels … and that’s the way it had always resonated with all its dwellers ….
pulllleezz inflict your condescension elsewhere!
Imran
YOU CANT STRIKE ME DOWN – thats totaly Awesome!! Hillarious to no extent – frigging mullahs and politcos – i hope they read it!!
I know one title no one can disagree with( I think )
KARACHI the F**CKED UP
LOLLLLLLLLLL – not just a age limit..i think an IQ above room temperature should also be a pre-req.
(except for 3 authors)
Love as always
Vader, the Dark Sith
Karachi:Where pathans become entrepreneurs.
I was laughing my butts off by this one!!!
So I close my eyes and think about Karachi. I see a mature beautiful woman, who is the ultimate combination of beatuy with breains. She has her shortcomings but yet so captivating that you cant help falling in love with her. Her eyes reflect the experiences that she has seen and her smile reflects her determination to contiune progressing despite what comes her way. Her candor is her elegance and her gusto is her mystique. She has many that adore and admire her, many that loathe and despise her and many who want to use her. And for someone as diverese, all encompassing and universalistic as Karachi the only colour I can see is White.
Thats what I think of my – our, Karachi, a city of raw emotions, colorful history and glorious future.
This is the BEST of the BEST comment in all the ‘crap’ ;P above by different people. My friend i really admire your words. GUYS! this is called creativity.
how about you design the logo and blog it so that we all can see it. And maybe other designers visiting this blog can send their enteries too and we can take the excersie to the next level. Don’t you think? :)…
Is everything okay guys???? :S
first thing is that Karachi is much more like a factory…. It does not need a Brand. BUT the people who live in it are in turn tagged with the name. here actually the ‘products’ are trying to brand the producer!
Jamie…has gone underground..Cant see any replies from her…Come on SOMEONE has to finalize the issue. CAN WE OR CAN WE NOT BRAND KARACHI.
i ve been readin this met blog for ages, comments and all. one thing that characterises the comments is the intolerance of most of the ppl. although i dont believe that the commentors truly represent karachi’s population, coz we still havent seen a whole liberal-conservative fued or a pathan-punjabi-muhajir one for that matter, but the mood pretty much goes to say a lot abt karachiites. u go out on roads and more than embracing arms, i see flaring tempers. instead of a culturing melting pot, i see a city divided into economic staratas: the elite and the masses. instead of a business hub, i see a rat race to get rich and quick. i see a city that satisfies all of human’s basic animal instincts to survive in the dog eat dog world.
Quiet a few of you have critiqued whether the city could be branded or not (although not all of the crticism was in good taste). The fact that a number of you in your opinions indicated a disenfranchised feeling towards the city or pointed to some prevalent sub-cultures like the Pathans and Mohajirs (i sincerely hate using that terminology) is testimony enough that the city is in need of a single identity that all its inhabitants can relate to.
Branding is an excercise of finding prominent attributes and characterisitics of an entity to provide it with a sutiable reference. A number of city, provinces, states, towns and countries are branded in such way. May that be calling a place the land of the pure or the land of free or even a simple phrase like “Je me souviens” or the big apple, the idea is to create an identity for the locale.
A number of you being critical to the level of obscenity only prove the point that there is a certain level of disharmony amongst the individuals of the city that has devoid its citzen to creatively express their feelings. The resulting in angst and negative influences for all and sundry who call this place home. In such an environment the Sid’s description should not surprise any individual.
I certainly hope that in the future people commenting on this blog and are more constructive in their attitude. The city needs more individual to put their heads together and brainstorm towards something positive, which I am certain was the intention behind this post.
thanks kumail- :) good note to end on here-
Branding is an exercise of pinpointing qualities and characterisitics of something to provide it with a personality which one can refer to it with. Karachi is the common factor between us all- and diversity can be a good thing only if we let it. If nothing, this sharing of viewpoints helps widen one’s own thinking and imagination and perception- and that fulfills what was the intention of the post.
I appreciate everyone who took time out to think about this- for the most part of it comments were in the good humour, intelligence and fun.
and on that note, I render this thread closed. peace.