An artist says he plans to take legal action after seeing the new branding at the Saluhall food hall in San FranciscoA San Francisco artist says the art at the city’s new downtown food hall looks “like a carbon copy” of his own style and he doesn’t think it’s an accident., Tim Lahan, who lives and has an art studio in San Francisco, said his phone was bombarded on Thursday with friends messaging him photos of the branding at San Francisco's new Saluhall food hall.
He described the branding in Saluhall as"almost like a carbon copy of that style, down to like the fidelity of the line work and how I approach that and everything." An image of a design by Tim Lahan. Image courtesy Tim Lahan. An image of the design in the Saluhall food court in San Francisco. Lahan said of the Salulhall branding,"Not only is the line quality identical to how I would do it, the concept in and of itself is something that I am known for."
Because the Saluhall designs are already all over the new food hall, Lahan doesn't foresee the operator taking down all the branding anytime soon.Larry Townsend, a copyright and trademark attorney with Owen, Wickersham & Erickson in the Bay Area, said of the designs in question:"Based upon what I’ve seen, it’s a fairly simple image, but it's probably sufficient creativity that would be protected by copyright.