What can you design at

Complexity is the root of all troubles:

Just like “Too many cooks spoil the broth”, too many unnecessary elements can also spoil the logo. There are several live cases that teach us the importance of NOT using too many elements out of proportions. Even though some designs were created by famous logo designers, they failed because of this menace. Here are some ways in which design elements can ruin your logo design:

1. Non-contextual symbols:

Whenever symbols are being selected for a logo design, they should be in context with the company and its business nature. You wouldn’t like to see a clown shaped face in corporate logos…would you? The perfect example of this mistake in the UK market would be the Burnley logo design. The logo contains a jumble of vivid ribbons making it an altogether substandard logo. Moreover, they have no contextual relevance to the Burnley values or culture.

2. Irrelevant and Inappropriate fonts:

Fonts are the prime element in a logo design. They allow you to inform your identity in words. Using irrelevant fonts is another major factor in failure of logo designs. A living example of logo disaster in UK arena is the London 2012 Olympics logo. The design failed to impress the people of UK as the symbols did not encompass values and traditions of London or UK for that matter. As you can clearly see below, the vague shapes have turned this logo into a mess-up.

3. Too colorful or color blind:

Another important aspect that is not to be overlooked in the logo design is color selection. Vibrant and bright colors are not always suitable for every logo. How would you portray a corporate company with a rainbow color logo? For a circus, it would look appropriate but for a sober organization it isn’t relevant. Remember Kraft’s takeover of Cadbury UK? Well Kraft also redesigned a very childish and colorful logo design. It was highly inappropriate and didn’t correspond to their business nature.

4. Wrong placement of the elements:

Sometimes when you are using too many elements in the logo design process, you can get the placement of elements wrong. That is why simplicity is always advised to minimize chances of errors. Badly used design elements can evoke inappropriate and sometimes offensive meanings. The Office of Government Commerce(OGC), an independent Office of the Treasury in UK, faced a similar typographic disaster. The logo’s font placement connotes to very obscene and vague meanings and was highly ridiculed in the UK market.

Breaking the clutter – Simple and Sweet:

The trouble with logos nowadays is that they are everywhere. Every year, new companies and businesses are established, with their own logo designs, cluttering the media space. The challenge for the newbie is to break the clutter and become noticeable to the target customers. The secret is to keep your logo design as simple and straightforward as possible to symbolize truth and sincerity.

As the great Richard Bach once said: