Canada’s Walk of Fame maple leaf logo has sprouted new leaves, thanks to Taxi, the creative agency that got its start in Montreal. Less stylized than the original maple leaf star logo, the rebrand looks more dynamic and less generic. This makeover extended to the stationery system and award trophy too.

A knock-off of the Hollywood Walk of Fame, the Canadian version is a plug for home-grown talent. Since Canada’s Walk of Fame was introduced in 1998, about 130 world-renowned Canadians, mostly in the entertainment industry, have earned a maple leaf star on the sidewalk in front of Toronto’s Metro Square, next to Roy Thomson Hall, including William Shatner, Michael J. Fox, Martin Short, Kiefer Sutherland, John Candy and Catherine O’Hara. The list of Canadian stars is quite surprising and impressive. As the civic leaders had hoped, the Wall of Fame has become a tourist attraction, provided a lot of media buzz through the inductee nomination process, and fostered national pride by reminding Canadians of all the world-class talent that come from these parts. That’s not too shabby, eh?

Bear with me. This is hard to explain. We got interested in this story because we loved the graphics and packaging for the new Museum of Unnatural History in Washington D.C., which isn’t a museum and not a real store either. It’s the Washington D.C. location for 826 National, a nonprofit tutoring, writing and publishing organization founded to assist kids aged six to 18 with their writing skills. It got its start at 826 Valencia Street (hence the name), a storefront location in San Francisco’s Mission District. To make the place seem “cooler” to kids, the 826 founders decided to disguise it as a “Pirate Store” and stocked it with pirate supplies like peg legs, message bottles and hooks. Kids loved it and sales helped support the tutoring programs.

As the 826 concept spread to other parts of the United States, the idea of creating a tutoring place within a wacky “store” continued. This explains the existence of the Space Travel Supply Co. in Seattle for spaceship accessories, ray guns and the like; the Superhero Supply Co. in Brooklyn, fully equipped with masks, caps and suction cups; The Boring Store for spies in Chicago, with disguises, trenchcoats and night goggles; the Robot Repair and Supply Store in Ann Arbor for robot emotion upgrades; the Bigfoot Research Institute in Boston for Yeti hairballs; the Time Travel Mart in Los Angeles for dinosaur eggs and time-machine fuel, and now the Museum of Unnatural History in America’s capital.

Graphic designer Oliver Munday took the lead on designing a brand identity and packaging for the Museum of Unnatural History and its merchandise line, and was supported in this effort by Oliver Uberti and Minh Le. The project was entirely a volunteer effort.

Yes, the products are really for sale and the proceeds will go toward supporting the educational programs offered by 826 National. All for a good cause.

This week the U.S. Treasury unveiled new $100 currency redesigned to discourage counterfeiting. If counterfeiters are deterred by ugliness, this should do the trick.

Okay, we understand the need to incorporate high-tech security features, but was it really necessary to make statesman Ben Franklin look like comedian Jack Benny? Who’s idea was it to stick the Liberty Bell in an orange inkwell and feature the back side of Independence Hall instead of the front? And why was Franklin dressed in a lavender jacket and shoved off-center so an offensive blue 3-D security ribbon could run down the middle? It seems like our most revered American symbols are being mocked.

Still… if anyone offered to give us a suitcase filled with ugly new $100s if we’d stop complaining about the bad design, we’d gladly accept.

How do you brand a banana? It’s a generic fruit, like an apple or peach. right? If you live in the tropics, you can grow bananas in your backyard. Still, for the past 65 years, only one banana has a brand identity, not to mention, a name, a face and a personality – Chiquita.

Back in 1944, Chiquita charmed consumers by turning a caricature of Carmen Miranda, the flamboyant Brazilian samba singer/dancer with the tutti-frutti hat, into its brand icon. Then to reinforce its slogan “Quite Possibly the World’s Most Perfect Food,” it created a little blue sticker that to this day it affixes by hand onto every single banana it sells.

Although the banana is the butt of countless jokes, Chiquita is one smart marketer. It has evolved its blue sticker concept and introduced a family of “cool” and playful characters created by DJ Neff and Mark Krajan of Neff Ink. Partnering with The Famous Group in Los Angeles, Neff didn’t stop with stickers. He built an entire campaign around the storyline “Don’t let another good banana go bad” with viral videos, sticker generator and a 3-D flash game called “Banana Boogie Battles.” Now a new generation of kids can interact with Chiquita.

Mucca’s custom-designed type for Brooklyn Fare , called Fare Serif, is presented large in lieu of imagery and projects the unintimidating feel of a first-grade “Dick and Jane Primer.” The text, too, is charmingly direct and humbly free of superlatives. Although the brand elements are applied to every part of the store, from the food labels, wayfinding system, produce displays, and staff uniforms, to the napkins and cups, the effect is smart and playful. It gives Brooklyn Fare the approachable attitude of a 19th century grocer, offering 21st century amenities like sushi, croissants and catering.