Sharjah Museums AuthorityCopied

Sharjah Museums Authority unveiled its new visual identity on 19 October 2026 to mark 20 years since it was founded. The state news agency WAM reported that the identity brings the authority and its 20 museums together under one unified, contemporary visual framework, and ties it to the Ruler of Sharjah's emphasis on culture and knowledge. Gulf News, Gulf Today and Sharjah24 carried the announcement the same day and the next.

According to the authority, the design draws on the arches of Sharjah's historic buildings and museums, and uses flowing calligraphic elements meant to suggest creativity, movement, discovery and connection. The logo, graphics and icons form one visual system, with a colour palette that balances heritage and innovation. Director-General Maissa Saif Alsuwaidi said the identity expresses both the depth of the authority's mission and its ambitions for the future. No design agency was named.

The old logo, used on the authority's website since at least 2020, set a geometric emblem of interlocking loops, close to a star or knot, beside the name in small Arabic and English type. The new logo has no symbol at all. The Arabic name is drawn in tall, angular letters with long horizontal strokes, and the English name runs underneath in spaced capitals. The authority's launch post on X shows a stacked version, and the website header now uses a wide horizontal one.

The announcement gave no rollout timetable, but the website header already carries the new logo. Online reaction stayed close to the official channels, with news outlets such as Gulf Today and Emirati Times sharing the announcement on X.

Dropping the emblem is a bold choice for an institution, because the knot was the only part of the old logo you could recognise from a distance. The new lettering makes up for it, and the Arabic is the identity now, not a caption under a symbol. The real test is whether 20 museums can share it without all looking alike.