Tangram Terror

HSBC has decided that the best way to explain to corporate clients that it is a innovative and forward-looking institutution would be to get heavily into tangrams. The blurb explains it thus:

he tangram is a mental exercise that develops vision, focus and imagination — disciplines that are essential to the business of your future

We especially liked the bit about imagination. Here's what top struggling energy provider Dynegy has to say about its AWESOME tangram. Its explanation is slightly longer, but no less turgid or witless for that:

"A tangram can seem complex. Yet the more you look at it, the more you consider the possibilities of using each of the pieces, the more understandable it becomes. A tangram starts as seven precise parts. What's amazing is how many solutions can be created. The only limitation is one's imagination."

Dynegy's tangram is from back in 1998, when it changed its name from Natural Gas Clearinghouse, a name that explained what Dynegy did much too clearly. From Identityworks, noting the work that Enterprise IG did for its client:

"The figures it spawns run, skate and 'do handstands in the service of Dynegy's customers,' and bring the leader's vision to imaginative life."

Almost as foolish as the Consignia debacle. Although obviously HSBC assumed that in the thousands of years since the Chinese first invented it no-one else would have thought of appropriating a cool angular design to show how, er, imaginitive they are.