For this assignment, I have chosen to focus on three institutions that are personally relevant.
Logo 1: Antioch College
Growing up in Yellow Springs, OH, I have had the opportunity to watch a college go through bankruptcy, closing, and then re-opening and re-establishing themselves and an important academic institution.
The logo itself is fairly simple and clean. The colors of the college are crimson and charcoal (historically blue and gold), and the logo incorporates crimson with the logo and logotype both in white. The logo itself obviously had the ‘A’ super-imposed into the center. I’m lucky enough to know a bit about the history of this logo. It is a loose adaptation of DaVinci’s Vetruvian Man, and is so because the college used “Symmetry” as an unofficial motto for some time. This idea of DaVinci’s Vetruvian Man showing mathematical perfection works its way into the Antioch College’s strive for academic symmetry. With the simplicity of the logo, in both type and color, and with the background and meaning of the logo itself, I think it is a clean and appropriate representation of the college and it’s values and I can’t see any reason to change it.
Logo 2: ModCloth
For the past five years I have been a fairly loyal customer with ModCloth, an online clothing shop that features Indie designers, and I have also found their logo interesting.
They have kept the logo simple with a clean font and minimal color. The font is grey and the mushrooms are a light blue. If I didn’t know the history of the logo, I may have looked at the mushrooms as a throwback to the style of the subculture of the mid-1960’s. Both the mushrooms stylistic qualities come to mind as well as the reference to psychedelic drugs that had a huge impact on the pop culture of the 1960’s. However, I happen to know that the mushroom logo comes from the collection of vintage mushroom kitchen wear that the owners began collecting long before the company came into being. The mushrooms have both a vintage and modern appeal as well as a personal meaning with the owners. Also, in nature, mushrooms act as recyclers that, for example, grow on fallen trees, gaining nourishment. Like these mushrooms, ModCloth sells authentic vintage pieces (recycling old trends) as well as promoting the use of fair trade and environmentally friendly products. Being simple but meaningful, it acts as the perfect draw for the audience that ModCloth is trying to reach, that being primarily women interested in Indie fashion.
My third logo choice is one that is, again, near to my heart because it is a local business that I grew up around and eventually worked for in Yellow Springs, OH.
Celebrating their 25th anniversary earlier this year, Current Cuisine (gourmet deli and international grocery) has not, to my knowledge or memory, changed their logo since opening. The colors, green and white, represent a color them used throughout the store; forest green walls, black and white checkered flooring, etc. The typeface is simple and elegant while the larger ‘C’ seems to only serve as repetition.