On my desk, there is a pamphlet from the upcoming Canadian Student Leadership Conference (CSLC 2020). It was printed to encourage people to sign up as billets, though that’s not why I bring it up. Instead, it’s because I’ve been thinking about logos, and I found the one they drew for the event pretty interesting.
The logo itself is a tree, to reflect the theme of the event – From The Roots Up – but that’s also not why I noticed it just now. Instead, out of the corner of my eye, I caught that smack in the middle of the logo is a little circle wearing an orange cowboy hat.
This isn’t the only place an orange cowboy hat can be found in the pamphlet, and the hats are going to start popping up all over the place fairly soon. It’s the trademark of the Yorkton Regional High School, and if they’re doing anything the hat isn’t going to be far away. A previous CSLC conference is what made the hat a school trademark, they’re going to put it in the logo.
But I didn’t notice it in the main logo right away, and when I did it made me happy. It’s a nice subtle nod to the school without overpowering the logo. You might not even notice it the first time you see it, and the way it’s used is a symbol of the school’s role in the conference itself. It’s about a lot more than YRHS, but they’re at the center of it.
But then, I’ve been thinking about logos a lot lately.
It all started when the Yorkton Chamber of Commerce updated theirs. I didn’t think much of it for a while until I needed to use it for something, and I thought to myself “that logo is a bit more optimistic than it used to be.” Why did I think that? Was it the use of colour? They went to a combination of blue and gold. Was it the fact that it has a lot of lines that move upward? I wasn’t entirely sure, but I saw some optimism in the design.
Optimism is a good look for a Chamber of Commerce. Business does well in an optimistic climate, it’s easier to get people to spend money when they think everything is going to get better, so it’s appropriate to have an optimistic logo.
We are surrounded by logos, and all of them are trying to fit a mood or give you some kind of feeling towards the product you’re looking at. The logo on the bank calendar to my right is trying to look serious. The logo on a pamphlet for a children’s charity to my left uses messy crayon drawings to make people think of kids, and perhaps feel a bit parental.
Sometimes it can go awry. The pen in front of me has three logos on it, each representing a different aspect of the company that produces it, and since all of them are in a different style I’m not sure exactly what feeling the pen is trying to evoke. The result is visual chaos, which is a weird thing for a writing instrument, but the ink works.
The work of a logo is mostly emotional, it’s supposed to make you feel a certain way about something before you use, experience or interact with it. And while I don’t think a bad logo is going to ruin anything – I’m still using the pen – I can recognize that the positive feelings associated with a good one can really make a difference for an organization.
