By Bill Gardner
You simply can't organize 42,000 logos-the approximate number of designs now on the LogoLounge.com web site-and not notice commonalities. Categories. Directions. Insights.
And this year is no exception: There are trends, for better or for worse. We'd prefer for you to be the judge. But what this year's report also delivers is perspective. With the benefit of past year's reports already laid out, it is not necessary to view trends as isolated moments in time. Instead, they can be viewed as organic, growing, morphing and transforming. One trend links to another, and then another. From year to year, there is branching from existing starts as well as shoots that emerge fresh from the ground up. It's all very informative to observe.
Through the LogoLounge reports, you can look forward and backward, too. (Go to www.logolounge.com and look under Trends to see all of LogoLounge's past reports.)
Through the LogoLounge.com web site, you can search an enormous database by keyword, designer's name, client name, industry, client category, type of logo, and dates to find a few trends of your own, as viewed from your own personal perspective. And through the LogoLounge books (Books I and II are out now, and Book 3 will be released in Fall of 2006 by Rockport Publishers), you can gain even more insights from a collection of 2,000 of the smartest logo designs from the past year, submitted to LogoLounge from all over the world and hand-selected by a team of extremely well-respected identity experts.
The goal of LogoLounge is not simply to amass the world's biggest pile of logos (although it is likely that already). It's goal is offer context with the content so that you can make sense of it all and perhaps have a better idea of where you would like to go next.
The 2006 trends follow.
Blankets
Whether laid out flat, rippling in the air, or tightly clad to some other shape, many recent logos have been developed with all the qualities of a draped textile. These marks have a sense of place often defined by perspective as they appear to fade to the back. Blankets generally avoid the head-on geometric solution but allow their regimented qualities to be pushed about by the laws of gravity or shrink-wrapped to a surface. This connection to the logo's environment helps play out symbology in a clear but subtle fashion.
The Aquacon logo gives every sense of the water's surface without relying on waves, ripples or other trite visuals. These feel like an evolutionary step forward from Microsoft Windows' logo waving in the breeze or Bank of America's geometric landscape fashioned out by a symbolic flag.
1.Design Firm: Chimera Design Client: Aquacon 2.Design Firm: SD Graphic Design Client: Crabtree Lane Studio 3.Design Firm: Gabi Toth Client: Chequered Flag Limited 4.Design Firm: Brandient Client: Radiocom
Blenders
Intense with motion and light, these logos give the appearance of a form being swallowed by a black hole. Shapes seem to bend and warp as if trying to defy the physics of light. The dervish nature of these marks embody an energy quickly recognized and associated with the product or the organization.
These could be an outgrowth of a trend spotted three years ago-Natural Spirals-but those forms had a much more leisurely appearance. These logos seem to be powered up with a nearly alien type of drive. It is a trend associated with any number of consumables, from over-the-counter medications and vitamins to highly caffeinated energy drinks. Who knew the Tide logo would come back to us with such vengeance?
1.Design Firm: Brandia Client: Galp Energia 2.Design Firm: Shift Design Client: BP 75 Years 3.Design Firm: Brandia Client: Ola 4.Design Firm: Cato Purnell Partners Client: Guangzhou Baiyun International Airport
Buttons
Fully dimensional buttons with radius tops, highlights, shadows, embossing, and the occasional polymer dome seem to be everywhere. I can only imagine consumers with obsessive-compulsive disorders straining to avoid pressing each and every one of these. There's something about a nicely crafted button that feels right to a consumer.
It could be that the message is one of empowerment: Typically a button is pressed to bring about a useful consequence. Press the Dell button and a computer comes to life. Press the Beeline Cellular button and instantly connect to others. No surprise that these logos are generally associated with electronics and communications.
1.Design Firm: Wolff Olins Client: Beeline 2.Design Firm: DDB Client: Dell 3.Design Firm: America Online Design Client: AOL Web Properties 4.Design Firm: Judson Design Associates Client: Level 36
Dot Fuzz
Vision, motion, and energy seem to be conveyed with this updated approach to the age-old screen of benday dots. No one's trying to hide the screen pattern here. It becomes a part of the character of the mark, but generally as a subtle edge treatment to an sometimes uninspired graphic.
Interpreting the idea of motion with this technique has a different set of variables than the continuous tone Blur trend from last year's report. Dot Fuzz logos have a better chance of accurate reproduction, and their gritty nature may capture a double-take or two from the consumer. Studio GT&P of Italy used the effect in an inspired application for AJ Mobilitá Srl, a transport company. Even at close range, their seagull logo gives the viewer a sense of looking at a bird in the distant haze as it travels across the sky.
1.Design Firm: Strategy Studio Client: Dub Rogers Photography 2.Design Firm: Studio GT&P Client: AJ Mobilita' Srl 3.Design Firm: Chimera Design Client: Tennis Victoria 4.Design Firm: Chimera Design Client: Tabcorp
Orbs
If there's inexplicable magic to be sold, there's a good chance the idea is being conveyed in a jewel-like, mysterious crystal orb. These logos may not advance any technical knowledge, but they have the intrinsic value of a bag of ancient marbles cast from precious stones.
Stare into the orb, and you'll see shrouded layers, orbiting stars, swirling liquids and other worlds packaged in a size we could drop in our pocket. These logos convey a message to consumers that there is a complex universe behind the product, but it is neatly captured and contained in a simple sphere they can easily interface with. Every effort at photographic realism is critical to maintaining the illusion.
1.Design Firm: Apple Design Client: .Mac 2.Design Firm: Brandia Client: Sporting Clube de Portugal 3.Design Firm: Brandia Client: Lusomundo Premium 4.Design Firm: Takuya Kawagoi Client: Sony Ericsson
Dry Brush
Our attempts to avoid slick and stay on a human scale are played out with a combination of simple brush strokes and occasionally an economic cut-out of a geometric shape. It's a combination of a little chaos and a little control that suggests balance. It's a challenge to be both graphic and mortal at the same time, but this method seems to do just that.
1.Design Firm: M3 Advertising Design Client: Osaka Sushi 2.Design Firm: Kendall Ross Client: Precept Brands 3.Design Firm: Cheri Gearhart Graphic Design Client: Sarah's 4.Design Firm: Polemic Design Client: Fire + Ice
Embellish
A marriage of grit and finesse is responsible for the visual success of these marks. These are typically a dichotomy of fine details and dingbats knocked out of and assembled with a degenerated background element. Rich with rhythm and emotion, these logos are often though not exclusively associated with the arts.
The human process of collecting and meticulously crafting the various components is not lost on the consumer. This genre speaks well to a younger generation and the skateboard culture. Most important, though, is the influence of the artist Ryan McGinness, who has created a hybrid of graphic design and fine art with his installations.
1.Design Firm: Howerton+White Interactive Client: Buffalo Saints 2.Design Firm: The Flores Shop Client:Gridlock Paintball Team 3. Design Firm: Hammerpress Client: The Darling Room 4. Design Firm: Gardner Design Client: REB Textiles
Splat
From Rorschach tests to blood splatters, these logos express a certain chaotic energy. Sometimes it takes a second look to realize that a critical part of the logo is a spatter. At other times it takes a second look to see that there is much more than an uncontrolled raw splash of color.
One of the most amazing sets of logos I've seen in years are the splotch pictograms of soccer players created by Hesse Design of Germany for consideration for the 2006 FIFA World Cup. What at first appears as little more than a bug on a windshield suddenly comes to life as a player frantically driving for a goal with a ball exploding forward with equal force. What amazes me about this series are the subtleties you see in each when you squint your eyes.
1.Design Firm: Hesse Design Client: 2006 FIFA Worldcup 2.Design Firm: Edward Allen Client: World Uncorked 3. Design Firm: KOESTER Design Client: Q ink 4. Design Firm: Shift Design Client: Parque Temático da Madeira
Glow
This subtle vignette that serves as the ground for a logos may be the cousin to the traditional gray shadows of the past, but more often they suggest an internal glow. This technique has been turning otherwise unremarkable logos into something special with a certain softness.
Technically, the subtle gradation of color for a background field bucks traditional production rules for a logo. But these are rules that have been cast to the side with advanced technology and production methods. The vignette also might lock the application into a white-only background, but considering the effect, it's well worth it.
1.Design Firm: Sockeye Creative Client: ieLogic 2.Design Firm: Kaimere Client: Fairmont Hotels 3. Design Firm: Felixsockwell.com Client: Firefly 4. Design Firm: Carol Gravelle Graphic Design Client: Tournesol Siteworks
Transparent 3D
If any one technique has had a dramatic impact on logo design over the last few years, it has been the adoption of transparency for identities. Though this technique was forecast in our 2003 report, there was no calculating just how impactful it would be. Some logos in this year's field are identified for other trends, but they could pull double duty and fall into this category as well. With this report, we find ourselves dissecting a previous trend to trace its course.
These logos are fabricated from transparent layers that also take on form or gradation and highlights. Their luminous quality of light is engaging. Soon we could anticipate seeing transparent, yet tactile and textured surfaces.
Transparency has become a buzzword within the corporate world as more industries see the need to open their books and their practices to the public. Using actual visual transparency in a logo is a common metaphor.
1.Design Firm: Brandient Client: Europharm 2.Design Firm:Strange Ideas Client: Oceania 3.Design Firm:Gardner Design Client: MVP Architecture 4. Design Firm: Shift Design Client: SDNM Originário
Overlays
Another branch of the transparency trend makes strong use of multiple flat layers. Clarity of color is a necessity to avoid transitions that are desaturated and lifeless. These flat layers replicate the additive color effect of multiple light gel strata. All of these logos rely on the illusion of an inner light which seems to make us smile.
One of the driving factors behind the transparency trend is pure technology. Adobe Illustrator has made the additive color process a click away through layers with or without gradation. That means the effects can be controlled in a vector environment which is more conducive to experimentation than Photoshop.
The designers at Iconologic may have been responsible for creating the greatest audience for this look with their groundbreaking graphic solutions for the sport icons and venue graphics at the 2006 Winter Olympics in Torino. Their system relied on flat transparency, and the beautifully drawn sport pictograms were just as stunning in one color as four.
1.Design Firm: Iconologic Client: 2006 Winter Olympic Games 2.Design Firm: Brandia Client: TAP Portugal 3. Design Firm: Tanagram Partners Client: Davidson Oil 4. Design Firm: Grapefruit Client: UCS Romania
Filigree
There was a time that filigree only lived on currency, stock certificates, and cigar bands. That was then, this is now. The intricate interlocking weave of the Spirograph-like form sends a certain message of quality, prestige, and security. Its engraved appearance adds a sense of heritage to its application.
Whether in a close-up detail or a complete wreath, this technique creates an authoritative, impervious force field around the logo. It doesn't rely on mass: Instead, it uses an airy finesse that allows it to lock to a surface and gives the mark a sense of place. Last year's report discussed The Bank of New York logo, developed by Lippincott Mercer, which conveys a similar sense of beauty and security.
1.Design Firm: Gardner Design Client: RelianzBank 2.Design Firm: UNO Client:Minneaplois 3. Design Firm: Cato Purnell Partners Client: Bank West 4. Design Firm: Sockeye Creative Client: Adidas
Post Apocalyptic
“It's the invisible sphere. The traditional globe has been vaporized and all that is left behind is the atmosphere." I wish I had said these words or named this trend, but all credit goes to the incomparable designer Miles Newlyn.
If you are global, the globe is not the message: It's what you bring to the globe. AT&T doesn't bring us a sphere. It brings us the connectivity to transcend geographic constraints. The same can be said of Wolff Olins' solution for BT. Watching the animation of this logo you get a sense of the world's continents and the symbolic coverage of communication. Both of these solutions take advantage of transparency to intensify the effect.
1.Design Firm: Wolff Olins and Rufus Leonard Client: BT 2. Design Firm: Cato Purnell Partners Client: Bank Direct 3. Design Firm: Brandia Client: INAS-FID 4. Design Firm: Interbrand Client: AT&T
Vivid
After a glance at this year's trends, a secondary trend stands out: color. This is not just color, but unabashed color. Not in all sectors but in many, the desaturated or one- and two-color palettes of the past have been pitched to the heap. Hues are more vivid, and many logos are represented by the full spectrum.
Events, destinations, and celebration lead this group, but bold application of color is showing up in more traditional fields like communications and banking, for example. Technological barriers that used to limit logo color for pure economic reasons have become less of a concern. Companies have a greater presence on the internet and TV, both of which have light-driven, luminous RGB environments at their disposal. We've simply become more accustomed to saturated color.
1.Design Firm: Gabi Toth Client: Villa Schneider 2.Design Firm: FutureBrand Client: Wines of Chile 3.Design Firm: Cato Purnell Partners Client: BenQ 4.Design Firm: Duffy & Partners Client: The Bahamas Ministry of Tourism
Scribbles
This is a throw-back to our childhood when we didn't have to stay inside the lines. We could create bedlam with any color crayon we damn well pleased. These marks have a frantic nature about them that appeals to a younger generation, but note that the logos are generally brought back under our thumb with the addition of a formal element often typographic.
Here again we come back to the theme of controlled chaos. It's an opportunity for companies to show they have the ability to create an orderly freedom, a chance to escape the constraints of an organizational planet but not leave the gravitational field.
1.Design Firm: AKOFA Creative Client: Conquest Recordings 2.Design Firm: Planet Propaganda Client: Double Dutch 3. Design Firm: Edward Allen Client: Revolve Motion 4. Design Firm: MINE Client: Brainfloss
Bill Gardner is principal of Gardner Design and creator of LogoLounge.com, a unique web site where, in real-time, members can post their logo design work; study the work of others; search the database by designer's name, client type, and other attributes; learn from articles and news written expressly for logo designers; and much more. Bill can be contacted at bill@logolounge.com.
©2007 Logolounge Inc.
