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City of Chicago brand guidelines

The Chicago Design System documents official civic branding, municipal star geometry, Big Shoulders typography, and lockup standards for City of Chicago services.

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City of Chicago guidelines: Chicago
Chicago Captured 15 Sep 2026

Homepage of the Chicago Design System presenting an overview of identity elements and navigational tiles.

City of Chicago guidelines: PUBLIC MARK Our new logo for public use
PUBLIC MARK Our new logo for public use Captured 15 Sep 2026

City of Chicago public mark brand guidelines page showcasing logo variations, lockup rules, and co-branding arrangements.

City of Chicago guidelines: BASICS Our star, colors, type & icons
BASICS Our star, colors, type & icons Captured 15 Sep 2026

A design system page presenting foundational brand elements including the municipal star construction, color palettes, and an icon library.

City of Chicago guidelines: Typography
Typography Captured 15 Sep 2026

City of Chicago typography guidelines detailing the municipal typeface Big Shoulders and supporting fonts.

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Freedam's take

I love seeing civic design systems treat a city's visual legacy with such clarity. The Chicago Design System lays out its foundational civic marks, from the historic star geometry down to the Big Shoulders municipal typeface. Seeing how they engineered an OpenType ligature where typing CHISTAR renders the official star glyph feels wonderfully thoughtful for everyday staff. The structure also thoughtfully accounts for department lockups like CHI311 and community partnerships across pride and national flags.

At a glance

Sections
All Symbols · Basics · City Seal · Flag · Municipal Device · Public Mark · Typography · User Interface
Downloads
Figma
Tone
Civic, practical, and systematic guidance designed for public employees and community collaborators.

What I noticed

  1. The typography guidelines specify Big Shoulders as the municipal typeface in all capitals and explain that typing CHISTAR triggers an OpenType discretionary ligature to produce the municipal star glyph.123
  2. The Public Mark documentation covers horizontal, stacked, and shortened CHI variants, along with department lockups like CHI311 and inter-agency pairings separated by vertical dividing lines.456
  3. Color palettes are split into Primary, Secondary, Tertiary, Background, and States categories with labeled HEX codes and color names.78
  4. A banner at the top of the homepage displays a maintenance disclaimer indicating the site is not actively maintained.9

Numbers refer to the screenshots above.

What I could not see

  • Direct asset download packages, search functionality, and editable presentation templates could not be verified on the captured screens.

Ideas to borrow

  1. Civic organizations can embed municipal symbols directly into custom typefaces via OpenType ligatures to make brand graphics effortlessly accessible in plain text fields.2

Quick answers

What is the official typeface of the City of Chicago?

Big Shoulders is designated as the municipal typeface for headings, titles, banners, and posters, complemented by Roboto and Lora for secondary body text.110

How do you create the Chicago star symbol in text?

In supported design tools with discretionary ligatures turned on, typing CHISTAR in all capital letters using the Big Shoulders typeface generates the Chicago star glyph.23

Reviewed on 25 September 2026. Request a correction · I built this

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