CityLab’s guide to the #GrammableCity.

"In urban space, our desire to photograph and share virtually everything has spawned a new genre of urban pleasure grounds. They specialize in Instagram bait, a hybrid of ultra-popular immersive art … and increasingly ubiquitous brand activations," Benjamin Schneider writes in CityLab. "These social factories, as they might be called, tone down the art and branding aspects, leaving their social media appeal to do the heavy lifting."

Schneider's definition is part of CityLab's tongue-in-cheek "guide to the #GrammableCity," a collaborative analysis of the photo-friendly public art trends cities are adopting to drum up social media attention and attract ever more tourists.1

City Hall, which anchors any wide-focus shot of the letters, was built as the result of an international design competition in 1958.
City Hall, which anchors any wide-focus shot of the letters, was built as the result of an international design competition in 1958. - The proposals were bold and modern and resonated with an emerging concern over a postwar Americanization and corporatization of Canadian culture. Finland’s Viljo Revell won the jury over, submitting a futuristic design that has endured as a progressive symbol of Toronto to this day. Meanwhile, despite America’s supreme branding instincts and love of kitsch, its public sphere has mostly avoided this social media trend so far. The Toronto sign has generated more than 120 million social media impressions—the contemporary gauge of a city’s brand power. (One city official called it “the most successful marketing media branding project that I’ve ever been involved with.”) © Rebecca Blackwell/AP