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College of William & Mary unveils new logo


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As a former instructor of typography for the art department at a university, I can tell you specifically why the upside-down W in this logo does not work as an M:

A serif W does not necessarily need serifs at the bottom to work properly, so the W in this new logo works fine.

But a serif M such as this one does need serifs at the top to work properly, and when this W is turned upside-down, it does not have the necessary serifs at the top.

So it's not just a matter of it not looking right -- it actually IS not right.

And that's the designer's fault.

That's a bit of a stretch. There's no wrong way to design a letterform. There's no rule that says a capital M has to have top serifs. Granted most do, but there are exceptions, like Trajan, which is not a great typeface, but it's one with a lot of history, and the M has no top serifs. I agree this William & Mary M doesn't look right, and the lack of top serifs has something to do with it, but it's more the center spike and its offset connection there that does it for me. You just can't say that there's a steadfast rule for how certain letterforms are to be constructed. It doesn't work that way in a field where creativity and forward thinking have as much value as they do in art and design.

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[The postings on this site are my own and do not necessarily represent the position, strategy or opinions of adidas and/or its brands.]

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I agree that the ampersand doesn't work in this logo, but it's also the best thing about the logo.

Have you been listening to political debates or something?

Actually, I agree with Gothamite on this one. If the rest of the logo matched the ampersand, and if the ampersand were incorporated properly, this would be a better logo.

As a matter of fact, I was in favor of the ampersand before I was against it. It just depends on what the meaning of & is.

See, this is where I've had many arguments with type professors and other designers. Why does the ampersand have to match the type? I'm just asking. I understand that there are 'fundamental' rules within type...sometimes waaaay too fundamental for my liking.

I guess what I like about the ampersand has less to do with the actual ampersand and more with the fact that as a visual element, it adds much needed curves and softness to the very straight and heavy looking 'W' and 'M'. They could have used a myriad of things to do that, the most appropriate was the ampersand I guess. They could have used a design element unrelated to type, like a circle or an oval around the letters. Not sure how effective that would have been.

To reiterate, I smoked the ampersand.....but I didn't inhale.

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I really don't like the NCAA's rules regarding logos with Native American features. For the most part, these logos are not designed or intended to offend the tribes. You don't see Irish people getting mad at Notre Dame, or Scottish people fuming over NJIT's Highlander, and the NCAA doesn't make restrictions on those things, so why just Native Americans?

Apples and oranges. Notre Dame was set up to serve a largely Irish population where as very few of the institutions using Native American names were set up to serve Native Americans.

And as someone of Irish descent who cares enough about the plight of his ancestors to respect it on days that AREN'T March 17, I'm do take offense to the Fighting Irishman logo used by Notre Dame as it is based off the charicatures that were used to dehumanize the Irish in the early 20th century.

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I really don't like the NCAA's rules regarding logos with Native American features. For the most part, these logos are not designed or intended to offend the tribes. You don't see Irish people getting mad at Notre Dame, or Scottish people fuming over NJIT's Highlander, and the NCAA doesn't make restrictions on those things, so why just Native Americans?

Apples and oranges. Notre Dame was set up to serve a largely Irish population where as very few of the institutions using Native American names were set up to serve Native Americans.

And as someone of Irish descent who cares enough about the plight of his ancestors to respect it on days that AREN'T March 17, I'm do take offense to the Fighting Irishman logo used by Notre Dame as it is based off the charicatures that were used to dehumanize the Irish in the early 20th century.

Ugh! if I hear another person bring up the 'Fighting Irish' in a Native American nickname argument I'm going to scream. Illwauk said it best with this comment.

I'm not going to hijack this thread...but I will say that so many people just don't get the fact that some nicknames are blatantly racist, while others are pretty harmless. The William and Mary Tribe nickname is not racist by any means, so it probably souldn't have been changed. But just because many of the nicknames that are being targeted, probably shouldn't be targeted it doesn't validate all of the other racist ones.

Native American people populated a large portion of this country when the settlers arrived. Now the majority of these great Native nations are gone or on the verge of being lost. It didn't happen by accident. Of course the changing of a racist nickname won't bring them back, but its a step in the right direction when it comes to respecting these people.

If I sound preachy, then oh well. I'm not saying anything that hasn't been said or written much more eloquently many times before.

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so many people just don't get the fact that some nicknames are blatantly racist, while others are pretty harmless. The William and Mary Tribe nickname is not racist by any means, so it probably souldn't have been changed. But just because many of the nicknames that are being targeted, probably shouldn't be targeted it doesn't validate all of the other racist ones.

Which are blatantly racist and which are not?

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Native American people populated a large portion of this country when the settlers arrived. Now the majority of these great Native nations are gone or on the verge of being lost. It didn't happen by accident. Of course the changing of a racist nickname won't bring them back, but its a step in the right direction when it comes to respecting these people.

The following is said with a very, very heavy dose of sarcasm meant to prove a point.

Yup...now we'll even forget their names and terminology thanks to political correctness, removing even that route to respect. Another generation or two, and the genocide will be complete. Go Whitey! :upside:

On 8/1/2010 at 4:01 PM, winters in buffalo said:
You manage to balance agitation with just enough salient points to keep things interesting. Kind of a low-rent DG_Now.
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I agree that the ampersand doesn't work in this logo, but it's also the best thing about the logo.

Have you been listening to political debates or something?

Actually, I agree with Gothamite on this one. If the rest of the logo matched the ampersand, and if the ampersand were incorporated properly, this would be a better logo.

As a matter of fact, I was in favor of the ampersand before I was against it. It just depends on what the meaning of & is.

See, this is where I've had many arguments with type professors and other designers. Why does the ampersand have to match the type? I'm just asking. I understand that there are 'fundamental' rules within type...sometimes waaaay too fundamental for my liking.

I guess what I like about the ampersand has less to do with the actual ampersand and more with the fact that as a visual element, it adds much needed curves and softness to the very straight and heavy looking 'W' and 'M'. They could have used a myriad of things to do that, the most appropriate was the ampersand I guess. They could have used a design element unrelated to type, like a circle or an oval around the letters. Not sure how effective that would have been.

To reiterate, I smoked the ampersand.....but I didn't inhale.

Well said. Some of the better logotypes featuring ampersands use a different style for the ampersand to add visual interest and to differentiate it from the words or letterforms that make up the logotype or monogram. Barnes & Noble is a good example that I can think of.

And for future reference, "They could have used myriad things to do that," not a myriad of things.

I still don't have a website, but I have a dribbble now! http://dribbble.com/andyharry

[The postings on this site are my own and do not necessarily represent the position, strategy or opinions of adidas and/or its brands.]

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As a former instructor of typography for the art department at a university, I can tell you specifically why the upside-down W in this logo does not work as an M:

A serif W does not necessarily need serifs at the bottom to work properly, so the W in this new logo works fine.

But a serif M such as this one does need serifs at the top to work properly, and when this W is turned upside-down, it does not have the necessary serifs at the top.

So it's not just a matter of it not looking right -- it actually IS not right.

And that's the designer's fault.

That's a bit of a stretch. There's no wrong way to design a letterform. There's no rule that says a capital M has to have top serifs. Granted most do, but there are exceptions, like Trajan, which is not a great typeface, but it's one with a lot of history, and the M has no top serifs. I agree this William & Mary M doesn't look right, and the lack of top serifs has something to do with it, but it's more the center spike and its offset connection there that does it for me. You just can't say that there's a steadfast rule for how certain letterforms are to be constructed. It doesn't work that way in a field where creativity and forward thinking have as much value as they do in art and design.

Even creative fields have their own internal rules. The arts well among them. No amount of creativity can re-define what is a complimentary or contrasting set of colors, for example.

Trajan might be the exception that proves the rule, but it also has extremely fine serifs. Nowhere near this one, and for that reason I tend to agree with conesbeans - a serifed M like this needs serifs top and bottom to look balanced.

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See, this is where I've had many arguments with type professors and other designers. Why does the ampersand have to match the type? I'm just asking. I understand that there are 'fundamental' rules within type...sometimes waaaay too fundamental for my liking.

I guess what I like about the ampersand has less to do with the actual ampersand and more with the fact that as a visual element, it adds much needed curves and softness to the very straight and heavy looking 'W' and 'M'. They could have used a myriad of things to do that, the most appropriate was the ampersand I guess. They could have used a design element unrelated to type, like a circle or an oval around the letters. Not sure how effective that would have been.

I don't think it has to match the type. Quite the contrary, I think a contrasting element like an ampersand can elevate a design.

This ampersand doesn't work with the design. It's too stylish and elegant for the rest of the mark. Rather than elevating the other letters, it merely points out their flaws.

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Native American people populated a large portion of this country when the settlers arrived. Now the majority of these great Native nations are gone or on the verge of being lost. It didn't happen by accident. Of course the changing of a racist nickname won't bring them back, but its a step in the right direction when it comes to respecting these people.

The following is said with a very, very heavy dose of sarcasm meant to prove a point.

Yup...now we'll even forget their names and terminology thanks to political correctness, removing even that route to respect. Another generation or two, and the genocide will be complete. Go Whitey! :upside:

The said thing is, that somewhere in this country there is someone writing and/or reading the very same thing on another kind of board WITHOUT the heavy does of sarcasm.

That kind of scares me a bit.

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See, this is where I've had many arguments with type professors and other designers. Why does the ampersand have to match the type? I'm just asking. I understand that there are 'fundamental' rules within type...sometimes waaaay too fundamental for my liking.

I guess what I like about the ampersand has less to do with the actual ampersand and more with the fact that as a visual element, it adds much needed curves and softness to the very straight and heavy looking 'W' and 'M'. They could have used a myriad of things to do that, the most appropriate was the ampersand I guess. They could have used a design element unrelated to type, like a circle or an oval around the letters. Not sure how effective that would have been.

I don't think it has to match the type. Quite the contrary, I think a contrasting element like an ampersand can elevate a design.

This ampersand doesn't work with the design. It's too stylish and elegant for the rest of the mark. Rather than elevating the other letters, it merely points out their flaws.

I guess thats where we differ in opinions. I like it for that very reason. It adds the balance of elegance to very mundane looking letter forms. I think it all has to do with the size of the ampersand. If it were much larger it would overly dominate the other two forms, and draw way too much attention to itself. I've seen this happen in some of the 'A&M' or 'A&T' letterforms over the years.

LOL! This reminds me of so many college critiques that I've sat through about design. There's always two different viewpoints to just about EVERY element of design...in some classes there were 15 or 20. :)

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i actually was on the committe that designed the new logo and worked with pheonix. we never even actually thought about the m being and upside down w. in fact, that never was even discussed so how people think we meant to do it is a question. we looked at different ampersands and liked that one the best and that size the best too.

we do have one without the ampersand in the new design if you go to our website, its in a circle. i'd be happy to answer any of the questions you guys have about the logo - we are proud of it and glad we chose it, especially over the 600 other designs pheonix presented us with.

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i actually was on the committe that designed the new logo and worked with pheonix. we never even actually thought about the m being and upside down w. in fact, that never was even discussed so how people think we meant to do it is a question. we looked at different ampersands and liked that one the best and that size the best too.

we do have one without the ampersand in the new design if you go to our website, its in a circle. i'd be happy to answer any of the questions you guys have about the logo - we are proud of it and glad we chose it, especially over the 600 other designs pheonix presented us with.

Hey thanks for the info.

I looked on the site and actually found the letters inside of the circle sans ampersand. Its here on this page. That is exactly what I was talking about when I mentioned that if they removed the ampersand, they'd need some kind of circular element juxtaposed against the blocky 'W' and 'M' letters.

http://www.wm.edu/news/index.php?id=8509

I still think the ampersand works best.

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so many people just don't get the fact that some nicknames are blatantly racist, while others are pretty harmless. The William and Mary Tribe nickname is not racist by any means, so it probably souldn't have been changed. But just because many of the nicknames that are being targeted, probably shouldn't be targeted it doesn't validate all of the other racist ones.

Which are blatantly racist and which are not?

Blatantly racist?

Um....how about 'REDskins' or 'REDmen'. When you include the color of someone's skin in the mix, you are in the 'blatantly racist' category.

Which are not?

Braves, Warriors, Chiefs (depending of course on what the logo looks like), and basically any name of a recognized tribe that is endorsed by that tribe. I think thats the main issue going on with the 'Fighting Sioux' in North Dakota versus the NCAA.

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I think that's an important point - when it references an actual tribe, you need to get the consent of the tribe.

Other than that, my own personal rule of thumb is that jobs are okay - chiefs, braves - but race is out - indians. Not to mention anything as explictly racially caricaturing as "redmen".

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The problems with William and Mary's new logo has nothing to do with the American Indian debate. It wasn't the school's fault that they had to drop the feather - that's on the NCAA. But what's done is done. That doesn't excuse the garbage they produced.

William and Mary needed to decide on a mascot first. They either needed to change the name "Tribe" or come up with something else to pair with it. For example, Georgetown uses a bulldog to go with their name "Hoyas". And it works fine.

But instead, William and Mary tries to have it both ways. They want to stick with "Tribe", even though they can't display feathers, tomahawks or anything else of the like. The result is a useless name, and a logo without any personality.

William and Mary either should have created an eagle or something to go with their name, or should have stuck to the classic seals of the past. At the very least, they should have come up with a W and M that weren't created with WordArt.

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Phoenix, huh? That explains why it isn't as good as it could be. It's my personal opinion, but any firm that presents you with 600+ design choices is looking to get out of your office as quickly as possible with the loot and move on to the next big-paying job it can breeze through and use to pad its wallet. This type of mentality shows in Phoenix' other work. To this day, I can honestly not figure out why they get the big clients that they do; their peers in the industry don't even hold them or their work in high regard. I can't see why clients do.

I still don't have a website, but I have a dribbble now! http://dribbble.com/andyharry

[The postings on this site are my own and do not necessarily represent the position, strategy or opinions of adidas and/or its brands.]

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i have to agree with you andrew - phoenix sucks, and I can't comprehend why they get the business they do either. My thoughts is that bosack, rickabaugh, and dan simon should all band together with torches and assault the phoenix office....then they could be reborn from the pile of shi - i mean ashes and start fresh with a better design team and philosophy.

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