Just a quickie: my university (and current employer) has announced the winning design in the identity competition.
The winning design by Rasmus Snabb
I’m not ready to give my opinion just yet, I need to digest it first. Right now I think Helvetica might have been too obvious a choice for the font, especially if the designer had gone for something “different”. But I have to admit, this isn’t something you would expect to see from a top level university as their logo. And it’s been fun to watch people’s reactions all over the web.
Update: here is the designer’s justification for the design:
The logo doesn’t have a static visual form, it can be endlessly rearranged and changed. The typeface Helvetica has been chosen because it is the most “meaningless” typeface. The primary colours are used because in this combination the have no symbolic value but merely represent “all colours”.
That’s an interesting justification. If they get the right agency to implement the design and they introduce good color palettes for different departments etc, it could really lead to something. It’s starting to win me over a bit.
Also, I’ve seen the logo parodied a bunch of times already. It’s simple to copy (by any standard) and it’s becoming instantly recognizable. Are we seeing the birth of a true design icon already?
Update2: Wow, now we have an Aalto logo generator!
Update3: And another one!
Update 4: And now there’s even an Aalto identity website converter
Wow, I think my gut instinct was right. This identity is incredibly viral, and already downright iconic.
I don’t like it at all.
I think it is very irritating, but I guess I get used to it and might start to even love it…That has happen before.
Well I think it’s probably one of the best identities I’ve run across. It implies an open foundation for ideas rather than anything university-like. No font does this better than Helvetica – give room for everything else.
I’m suprised that most of the reactions I’ve seen have been negative while my own reaction has been that this makes me slightly proud over becoming an Aalto student.
This logo starts growing on me. The initial impression was not very positive, but the whole fact of the logo being dynamic and not having a constant form is cool, and reflects the whole Aalto identity.
However, it would have been nice if the designer would have taken the history of three universities into account somehow, for example in the colours. HSE for instance identifies strongly with the deep green color, and one of the colored letters could have been in the deep HSE green, instead of the current blue, yellow and red. I guess TKK has used the blue in their logo for ages as well. Not sure about TaiK
This whole thing sucks ass