It’s funny how the littlest things can spark a debate… even a logo. The 2014 Olympics are now in full swing—and so is the debate over the Sochi logo.
An article in The New Yorker points out just how different this Olympic logo is from previous years. “Anyone who has watched an Olympics whose vision is sharp will notice that the logo for Sochi 2014—which appears in every stadium, on every ticket, and on tens of millions of dollars’ worth of Olympic merchandise—is remarkably different from those of previous Olympics. It contains no drawing and features only unassuming lowercase lettering, the five Olympic rings, and a Web address.” (http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/currency/2014/02/sochi-and-olympic-logos.html)
A web address in the actual logo? That certainly has never been done with an Olympic logo before.
After more than ten revisions with the design team at Interbrand Agency, the 2014 Organizing Committee settled on a more “future-oriented logo.”
The New Yorker article states, “The symbol uses a typeface that resembles the Revue font, according to John Reinhardt, a book designer. Revue, designed in 1968 by Colin Brignall, is typically used for posters and billboards. These days, to woo the Internet generation, brand logos need to not only fit on posters, hats, clothing, and jumbo-TV screens but work successfully on tablets and iPhones. At sochi2014.ru, users can view each day’s Olympic program and receive up-to-the-minute results, background information on each sport, and biographies of the athletes.”
Russian bloggers seemed to think the logo was too simplistic or difficult to read; but there wasn’t a huge opposition to the logo internationally. However, some felt that the alternate logo by the “Moscow firm Studio Transformer, would have been more in tune with the Olympic tradition. Most of those who recorded their reactions on design sites such as Logo Design Love came out in favor of tradition.”
Here are the two logos, side by side. What do you think? Do you prefer the more traditional design on the left? Or the more futuristic one on the right?
To read the full article, click on the link: Behind Sochi’s Futuristic Logo
To visit the Sochi 2014 website, click here: http://www.sochi2014.com/en