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London 2012 Olympics logo revealed. What do you think?Jun 04 2007 | Design |
So- London won the 2012 Olympic bid. Good for them? The logo for the London 2012 Olympics has been revealed, and the new brand launch is explained. The initial design back in 2005 has been scrapped and the new one is being labeled as…well for the most part- rubbish.
“Looks just like a window I recently kicked a ball through.” posted by: 3-1inyoursuperbowl

“This is the vision at the very heart of our brand,” said London 2012 organising committee chairman Sebastian Coe.
My first impression was that it read “20 R” and it also conjured up old Rossignol Ski logos. Then I felt it was some post Pangaea depiction of the continents and maybe they were attempting to show the UN to some degree. The block like forms and the color schemes all give me the impression of the 80’s and not anything new and sporty. I feel a lot more could have been done in terms of creating an emblem that expresses the ‘Olympics’ more than the ‘year’.

Here are the proposed logos for the bidding countries back in 2005. You can see that earlier version is much more conservative and traditional. I liked New York’s idea, especially the choice of font and color- maybe I am partial, but I liked Moscows attempt also. The icon of the Statue of Liberty looked a bit to “Rocky” for me, but that could have been refined.
I have been on the designing end of many a logos, within a collaboration or solo so I know how hard this can truly be . But for a project for the Olympics with a hefty budget this surely could have been thought out better. Then again there is that saying that if everyone likes what your doing, you are doing something wrong.
What do you think?
We can always look forward to Beijing in 2008… this logo seems consistent with the culture’s iconography, expressed in the emblem, and the Chinese red color. Simple and sophisticated this works for me.
(via: newstoday)
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Posted by Patrick Winfield at 4:17 pm
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June 4th, 2007 at 6:35 pm
Nooooooooooooooo, make it stop.
This is a piece of crap. £400,000 on what? I can’t believe we get the Olympics and now can’t even get together a decent logo.
It would have been better to put it out as a contest to 8 year olds and pick the best one.
No one in the UK seems to like it except the Olympic Committee.
June 4th, 2007 at 8:27 pm
They tried something different - unfortunately it is way too different, it doesn’t convey the Olympics to me in any way…
June 4th, 2007 at 9:40 pm
It may not convey the olympic feel but it does show what Londod is.
When I look at that I see a fractured entity that has no idea what it is or what it wants to be. I see confusion and a total lack of a grasp on reality.
June 4th, 2007 at 11:55 pm
This is scary, quite frankly. London is such an amazing city and this is not a reflection of London.
Sorry…back to the drawing board.
Also, don’t the Olympic “rings” have multiple colors; why such drastic departures?
June 5th, 2007 at 8:45 am
Why the color change? It represents Londons new views on multi-culturalism. Because only 5 colors can be represented it wouldn’t be fair to have any colors in the design. The colors not present would whine and complain that they were not included.
June 5th, 2007 at 9:39 am
Lyndon Antcliff I agree, this is a classic case of design by committee- to many cooks in the kitchen maybe.
I like the contest idea a lot better- why not get a bunch of kids and crayons to do the hard work and just pick one…hmmm…child labor laws maybe.
Thanks for comments!
June 5th, 2007 at 9:43 am
Jake- I agree. This concept seems to have lost the tradition of the Olympics and replaced it with some brand that screams words like ‘rad’, ‘mtv’ and ‘freestyle’ at me.
Yes- the rings seemed to be a tertiary design element here- slightly conveying the ‘0′.
June 5th, 2007 at 9:20 pm
all i can say is, London–wtf?
June 9th, 2007 at 9:33 am
I notice you didn’t go back and look at the Munich logo. Almost as bad as the London logo…
June 21st, 2007 at 8:46 am
they should be in nyc!