2011 Logo Trend: Banded

The report for 2011 shows that color is still prevalent, but scaled down in the form of tints. Brown or gray is dominating the neutral hues. Meanwhile blues and greens are softer. They’re seeing more Pinks too.

Lightness is being carried out in other ways: Airier shapes that seem to lift off the page, line weights are thinner, and there’s plenty of transparency as well. Here’s a quote that sums up this year’s trend rather well.

It feels like what people believe a logo to be is also becoming more transcendent. A logo is no longer a single piece of flat art. It can be a favicon, an icon, or an entire set of marks that work together to support the team. Its boundaries have become less strict as well. There was a time when most logos could be enclosed in a simple hand-drawn square, circle or similar geometric shape, but now many logos drag outside those outlines. They just don’t want to fit the old mold.

Here are the trends they identified this year:

• Gradients
• Juvi
• Vibrate
• O
• Earth
• Monoline
• Series
• Brown
• Dandruff
• Concentric
• Loopys
• Banded
• Comma
• Buckys
• Fruit

Check out the full gallery here. Image courtesy of LogoLounge. Credits: 1. BrandBerry, Artive 2. Higher, Voscast 3. Dickerson, Healing Touch 4. Frog Design, Microsoft Word

2010 Logo Trend: Shift

Catching up myself with LogoLounge’s annual logo trends. Last year was awesome for logos!

This year some of the tools available to designers has had a hand in some of these trends. For example, new Ilustrator tools such as Swirl, Pucker, and Scriptographer have clearly left their mark. We also see that current events also influence ideas that make their way into logos. For example, O-shaped logos popped up after the 2008 U.S. Presidential elections. There are also new standards like Transparency. We’ve seen plenty of them now to be perceived as a trend. Transparency is here now. We also see an increase in hue brightness, and  it’s most likely due to the pervasive use of on-screen color, which is light that is projected (and also RGB and not CMYK). Text based logos are really strong as clients and designers are distilling their messages to be concise and direct. The use of color has been greatly expanded.

Here are the trends they’ve identified for 2010:

• Cubist
• Spores
• Ghosts
• Tendrils
• Shift
• Parts
• Pixels
• Hexahedron
• Dust
• Peepshow
• Festoon
• Stains
• Burst
• Wallpaper
• Box-up

Check out the full gallery here. Image courtesy of LogoLounge. Credits: 1. Asta form, Sheriff Studio 2. Go Welsh, Penn State Architecture 3. Effusion Creative Solutions, musicplace.com 4. Liska + Associates Communication Design, Becker and Becker.

Looks like the W3C has announced a new HTML5 logo to brand their efforts to advance what may or may not become the new standard in web coding, the HTML5 web standard. It sure seems as if everything today needs some sort of branding. How else can we get a message across in a split second of someone’s attention? So, some gripe, some rejoice, some think that it’s controversial. Who, why?…

The New HTML5 logo by the W3C

Who? Web developers. And they’re not addressing the looks of the logo. Why then? Well, web developers are stating that with the new orange and black crest, the W3C is using HTML5 as a general term that includes all upcoming web tools and interweaving standards such as CSS and SVG. The claim is that these separate technologies all have applications outside of HTML and therefore the new brand somehow places them “under” or “inside” a general term like HTML5. The issue’s not aesthetic. While they do have a point, who can say if any of us knew what those technologies are or that they exist if it weren’t for HTML. Yes, in 10 years nobody will be mentioning it much, but we’re here right now and HTML brought us here whether we like it or not. And as always with branding, connective technologies need a hero. A single icon or meme that spreads in people’s minds like wildfire. And HTML is already here, so why not?

Gizmodo designers took a stab at logos for some of these technologies. Check out the Gallery after the jump. They’re all good too.

Starbucks is keeping up with the sense of pace that they create and manage for its ubiquitous brand.

They’ve updated their logo once again and this time with a decidedly minimalist presentation. They’ve put away the copy  “Starbucks Coffee” and the  palette is now one color.

All versions of the Starbucks logo applied to paper cups

Here’s a bit  of  what MSNBC had to say:

Starbucks says the changes amount to more than nips and tucks to its favorite lady. The fresh look goes with a new direction for the company as it makes its way back from its toughest times in its 40-year history.

The Starbucks logo through the years

And yes, we’re al familiar with the logo’s colorful controversy. A reminder courtesy of Adfreak for those who forget:

The inspiration for the siren logo—early versions of which have been called obscene by some—goes back to a 16th century Norse woodcut found by Seattle graphic designer Terry Heckler.

(pics and more via Starbucks)

Design History Primer 1 - Symbols

I recently wanted to read something on Design history since I really enjoy the subject and I find it so fascinating. And while looking for an interesting bit of Design history to read, I found DesignHistory.org. A site originally launched in 1999 by Nancy Stock-Allen as a companion to her lectures on Graphic Design History. The site has 11 pages of essential subjects in Design History. I’ll do a quick post on each after I’ve read them and give you my quick impressions and comments.

Clearly labeled as “not a substitute for attending class”, this first page covers the basics and offers enough to get your feet wet or refresh your memory on symbols and logos. It starts with a primer listing the differences between a pictogram, a rebus, an ideogram, a trademark/brand, a logotype, a printer’s device, a monogram, and a coat of arms & family crest. Today some of these are used or referred to interchangeably and knowing the difference will help knowing when and how to use each and whether to mix one with another when working on a project such as a logo.

Then it moves on to symbol contemporary symbol pioneers from Raymond Lowey and the Shell Oil logo to Paul Rand and the IBM logo to the AIGA and the International Transportation symbols (free for download here!.) Then a quick touch on digital symbols such as the CBS logo by William Golden and the original icon-based Macintosh GUI by Susan Kare. Very good to know about these and how digital symbols have roots in fine arts–where else?

An important section here is the section on Cultural Mismatch. The American Red Cross in the Middle East and the skull and crossbones and its recent evolution. Cultural issues of appropriateness and the ability to convey a message globally are increasingly more important as brands big or small go global. The world is indeed getting smaller.

Lastly it covers a bit of re-branding, citing Poland’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs and a new logo to be used to promote tourism and trade, and Nike–how the famous swoosh was perceived then and now. And a nice nod to Anti-Branding finishes off this piece with the world’s first global anti-brand created by Adbusters magazine and its Black Spot Sneaker. An eco-friendly, anti-brand sneaker in which the black spot replaces the corporate logo.

AIGA Design Archives Online

Love to look at what others are doing? Looking for inspiration? Love to look at excellent design? Head on over to the AIGA Design Archives, which feature selection from AIGA’s Annual Design Competitions. Covering everything from Brand and Identity Systems Design to Book Design, you’ll find a wealth of resources. With a sleek interface that’s easy to figure out and navigate, it’s a pleasure to browse through. Excellent design? Check. Inspiring? Check.

Works on the archive are selected from these AIGA competitions:

• About 365: AIGA Annual Design Competition
• About 50 Books/50 Covers competition
• Winterhouse Awards for Design Writing & Criticism
• Worldstudio AIGA Scholarships
• INDEX: | AIGA Aspen Design Challenge
• Regional AIGA competitions

I flip through these when I get them in print form every year as part of my AIGA membership, and it’s always a celebration of good design. Not just good looking, but good design. Good design looks good most of the time, but really isn’t it just doing it’s job? It makes us comfortable looking at the information, even inviting us sometimes. Making us feel comfortable (or uncomfortable) with the message. One of my professors told us once that Design is a logical sequence of events. And I agree with him. There’s an audience, a context, and a purpose. These are considered and evaluated, research has focuses our options, and execution and refinement have polish the project to a degree which makes the design exceptional.

Of course, good design often looks easy, and that’s part of the appeal. It looks easy because it’s relating to the viewer. The viewer feels almost like they could have thought of it themselves. And that’s a very good thing if you want to get your message across.

2016 Olympics logos

The International Olympic Committee has taken bids to determine which city will host the 31st Olympic Games in 2016. Chicago, Madrid, Rio de Janeiro, and Tokyo are going head to head and are doing everything they possibly can to win the prestigious spot as an Olympic host. And of course, they all went the extra mile and each city already has an official logo ready.

Today, the IOC released the report of the Evaluation Commission. The final decision will be announced one month from today. Who will emerge as the victor?

Based on these logos alone, it is even hard to make a choice. But let’s see what they have to offer on q quick assessment. All four have been executed so well. The Chicago logo, the most refined of the bunch, suggests height and light. Gothic Olympics?

The Madrid logo is the most playful one. It’s reminiscent of finger paintings, and the Olympic colors covering the hand (same as each one of the rings) suggest world unity and a summation of individual parts in order to complete a whole, and the colors reinforce the Olympic theme. My wife thinks it looks like Thanksgiving turkey drawings made by 5 year olds by tracing their tiny hands. Playful, yes?

I have to admit that the Rio de Janeiro logo has something going against it. What is that shape other than a heart? Mountains, sea and sun? Chances are that it is those things. It didn’t reveal itself so quickly. I had to really look and think about it. Now, I don’t mind, but the casual user doesn’t invest the time and effort into deciphering logos. A logo such as this needs to communicate on a global scale instantly. The typography is very nice and so is the graphic icon. But perhaps not hitting the mark as well or as quickly.

The Tokyo logo is… well… let’s see. We have looping motion with the swooshing around of lines in the colors of the Olympic rings forming a knot. Again we have world unity by way of the colors of all the strands, a reinforcement of the Olympic theme, and strength in numbers. Very representative of a collectivist culture such as Japanese culture. Finally, we have the Japanese flag represented by the red circle between the name of the city and the year of the games.

We could probably take more out of these upon further examination, but that’s the basics in a few sentences each. All very nice, all very unique. No matter who gets the hosting spot, we’ll have a nice Olympic logo in 2016. Don’t you think?

2009 Logo Trend: Circulate

Heavy-hitting logo design website for logo-lovers LogoLounge published the seventh annual Logo Trends feature. Always a great read, it shows how designers continue to push the envelope. The feature not only captures what has come out of designers’ minds over the course of the last 12 months, but it also informs what we might see later on. Full of color, shapes, text, and ingenuity, the latest trends do not fail to impress.

This year’s collections include:

• PhotoFill
• Concealed
• VariDot
• Candy Stripe
• Texting
• Encrust
• Monolgue
• Doily
• Flip Flop
• Mosaic
• Sequential
• Recycle
• Dandelion
• Circulate
• Gossamer

If you also want to catch up on previous year’s trends: here are the links:

2008
2007
2006
2005
2004
2003

Sample courtesy of LogoLounge.com