Logos are a showcase for design styles through out time. Back in the stone age (the 1940′s) logos didn’t even have drop shadows…pfft. In my daily browsing for interesting design, I came across a couple logo sites which caught my attention. Logos are really amazing, little images we associate with a brand, item or service and without them life would be much more boring. It’s that little bit of corporate fine art which makes living bearable. Not really, but that makes this article seem way more important.
Logoorange branding and identity has put togethera famous brands glossary (http://www.logoorange.com/logodesign-A.php). It showcases a number of very famous logos with some of the history and evolutions of said logos. It’s pretty amazing what has happened to the logos we take for granted. Most of the histories are pretty boring, but some.. well, I won’t spoil the surprise. I’m sure they’ll be adding more and hopefully people will help broaden some of the histories.
After searching for a font a client needed, I stumbled upon FontShop’s blog post ona Flickr post showcasing the Logos of Web 2.0 (http://flickr.com/photos/stabilo-boss/101793494/in/set-72057594060779001/). Now we all know that if you put and “e” before something, it will fail in a dot-com style 90′s disaster. But this is the new millenium (or is it still Willenium and when will that joke get old?) and all you need to do these days is add an “i” or “2.0″ before or after respectively. Or actually, not respectively…would Phonei work or 2.0 Web… hmm… a new trend? No. Yes respectively. So making your logo 2.0 is a surefire way to get rich or get your brand noticed in this new landscape.
A number of the logos are highlighted and you can get some more info or larger versions, but if you really want the full effect, download the full image. This shows the way a trend can be disseminated to all sizes and realms of businesses. It’s not necessarily a bad thing and I am recently quilty of creating “2.0ish” imagery and logos, but it could be the new design crutch with which we are stuck with.
Logos show trends in design both good and bad, but they also show what the public wants. If a logo gains a certain amount of fame, then others will follow and create similiar logos in attempt to garner some residual attention.
The best we can hope for is another innovative design strategy soon and then we’ll all look back fondly on those cute lil’ 2.0 logos.
