ModestWorks and Moniker’s identity for Dallas Trinity FC is a salute to the city the team calls home

When Dallas-based ModestWorks and San Francisco-based Moniker were asked to design the identity for Dallas’ first professional women’s soccer team – Dallas Trinity FC – the two studios were buzzing with ideas. The team would be part of the groundbreaking USL Super League, so crafting an identity that represented the spirit and potential of the team was no small task. From the very get-go, the studios realised that something had to be different about the story they’d tell of Dallas Trinity FC – it has to speak of more than the sport, and so, they decided to focus on the essence of Dallas and its people, its combined grit, drive and potential, and let that inspiration be the north star that guided the project.

“Dallas is a city with some big sports brand personalities, so doing something different was a focus from the start,” Robert Milam, Founder & Creative Director of ModestWorks tells us. “The other teams in town kind of have their own fields of gravity – the city reflects them more than they reflect the city. We saw that as an opportunity to differentiate Trinity and build a brand that would represent something more hyperlocal and representative of the people of Dallas.”

Before getting to the design, the studios had to set the story and the backdrop for the identity, and this included some deep research and taking an educated guess on what fans wanted to see from the branding. As Milam says, digging into the history of the city was eye-opening. “We consider work in the sports space to be cultural projects – they reflect the culture and build into its future. Dallas is this weird combination of irrational confidence and unexpected sophistication,” he says. “It’s a city built by brazen entrepreneurs who have taken big risks and struck it rich. It’s en vogue to denigrate the city as bland, ugly, or uncultured – but the truth is more nuanced. We believed Trinity fans would respond to a creative approach that celebrated the refinement and style of the city, giving a bit of a middle finger to the stereotype held by some out-of-towners.”

To kick things off, they decided on the name ‘Trinity’ as an homage to the Trinity River that flows from the northwest to the southeast through town, a thread that connects the city. Next, when the time came to craft the crest, a red neon Pegasus that has illuminated downtown Dallas from atop the 29-story Magnolia Petroleum Building since the 1930s stood out, as Milam says, as an easy choice. “The Pegasus is something every person in Dallas recognises as a symbol of the city, but very few people who aren’t from here know about it. We liked that and it aligned with our strategy – kind of an if-you-know-you-know symbol,” he contextualises. “And the story of Pegasus in Greek mythology is WILD. Having a mascot that was born from the blood of its beheaded mother, Medusa, felt sure to give other teams in the league pause before they take the pitch against Dallas.”

The refined, graphic Pegasus, with its sinuous curves, makes for a stand-out crest. Its form was inspired by a series of frescoes that were created in bas-relief by French artist Pierre Bourdelle in 1936 for the Texas Centennial Exposition held at Fair Park, a National Historic Landmark. When defining the look, the team painstakingly created no fewer than 200 versions, as Milam reveals. “Creating the perfect one was brutal. But perseverance paid off and we’re really happy with how the final Pegasus feels dynamic and balanced.”

If everything in the identity was taking notes from life in and the built spaces of Dallas, the typography, naturally, had to follow suit. The teams created two custom typefaces for the project – Trinity Sans and Trinity Flare. “Both were inspired by the typography forms found etched in the stone monuments and signs within Fair Park,” says Brent Couchman, Founder & Creative Director of Moniker. Taking notes from the monuments in Fair Park felt fitting as it is where the Cotton Bowl stadium sits, Dallas Trinity FC’s inaugural home. “Similar to the Pegasus, we knew this deco reference from Dallas’ history could give us something unique typographically and capture both the sophistication and precision we were looking for.” Both typefaces – Trinity Flare with its chiselled serifs and Trinity Sans with its confident forms – are imbued with a sense of elegance, and work equally well in applications across the crest, kit, posters and merch.

All in all, Dallas Trinity FC’s brand is a hat tip to the spirit and the rigour of the city it calls home. “From the beginning, our strategy landed on the idea that the most defining characteristic of Dallas is its approach to potential,” says Milam. “The people here ignore all limitations and believe they can manifest just about anything. Texans are all about taking action and delivering results, and the Trinity identity follows suit – it’s designed to feel timeless and relevant for a team that plans to be a leader in the culture of sport for decades to come.”