Typophile

Long Logotypes

Stephen Kelman

Got a brief for a Logo and the type is a whopping 9 words long - going to have to break it over 3 lines I think - would love to see any examples of longer logos and logotypes.

Thanks

Stephen

There's the surprising YWCA logo

Mr. Stephen Kelman, I invite you to post your idea for critic, remember :
think of the expression of an idea as a map to its meaning.

Regards,
AS

All I can think of is Law firms and brokerage firms. They are all lists of names. Eventually they either succumb to logic and adopt a shorter name or use an acronym.
Sometimes the full name is used until a brand is identified. Then they switch to something logo-able later. I have never seen a laundry list brand-name which works as a logo. You may be bucking with the partner ego problem where each partner wants billing.

ChrisL

Merril, Lynch, Pierce, Fenner, Smith and Ross became Merril Lynch
International Business Machine became IBM
United Parcel Service became UPS

My suggestion: Think of it less as a logo / more as a movie title

University of Arts London:
http://www.arts.ac.uk/

Is that big enough for you...?

Then it's just a question of colouring the bits that are relevant,

e.g. Central St Martins School of Art and Design
http://www.csm.arts.ac.uk/

e.g. London College of Fashion
http://www.fashion.arts.ac.uk/

Try scrolling over the 'logo' and it changes colour quite nicely.

BTW, what are your nine words, or are you not saying?

George Carlin had "nine little words you are not allowed to say on TV"
They were only four letters each though:-)

ChrisL

not that long, but maybe an inspiration for you.

Apparently he Atlantic is still a very real barrier:
people like to bring that up as a good example of how
to handle a really long name in a logo; while in fact
it's a really crappy attempt at mimicking the venerable,
and actually good, Yves Saint Laurent [bench]mark.

hhp

I usually don't like to knock other peoples work online but that Pricewaterhousecoopers thing is an abomination. And they have the money to hire really good designers.

ChrisL

Sure, it sucks.
I'm more interested in the Nine Words that make up this particular logo, so that maybe we can help Stephen take a new look at this project. Every graphic design job is a new challenge and a new opportunity to communicate.

George Carlin had “nine little words you are not allowed to say on TV”

Trivial point: It was seven.

What about putting them in a circle?

> It was seven

Or 13, if you're a sailor (as per Mr Krabs).

hhp

Mark,
I added the four-letter-words "Dude" and "Like" to Carlin's seven because of overexposure in today's generation :-)

ChrisL

"International Business Machine became IBM
United Parcel Service became UPS"

My favorite in this category is Minnesota Mining and Manufacturing that became 3M.

edit: typo

"Minnesota Mininga and Manufacturing that became 3M"

This is an excellent example of a long name moving to an acronym and a symbol in one felld swoop.

ChrisL

"If you had had to work on a PWC job you wouldn’t mind abusing someone’s work online."

LOL!!!

ChrisL

What not to do...

But Jem, that's only one word :-)

ChrisL

Here's what I did for my day job gig:

The logical thing to do with a long name like this is to enlarge/emphasize certain words in the logo and shrink/de-emphasize other words. Think focus and contrast, I guess.

--Michael.

------------------------------------------------------
// love what you do or do something else. //
Michael Ebert -- graphic designer, jazz saxophonist, horror movie devotee
http://homepage.mac.com/mwebert
mwebert@mac.com
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