Seattle Sounders FC
I am so happy that Seattle's new Major League Soccer ownership group listened to the fans on the naming of the team that I'm willing to look past the awkward blue shield in their new logo. The fact that the team will be called the Sounders is enough of a victory for me.
I don't even mind the FC part. I understand the need to differentiate between this team and the current, original Sounders. That makes perfect sense to me.
And I'm not just saying that because I plan on applying for a job with them and I'm super nervous about my Googleability. I'm moving back up to Seattle in July and I'd love to be in on the ground floor of a new franchise. I would've wanted to work for whatever they called the team, it's just a bonus they are the Sounders.
However, I do think this concept I wrote about last year is a far superior logo.
DAY AFTER UPDATE - After I wrote this review last night and read Dave's comment, I went to bed and while trying to fall asleep I thought more about the Sounders logo. I've come to the sad conclusion that I can't overlook the faults just because of the name. In fact, because I love the name so much, I really feel cheated now by this lackluster effort.
I mentioned the second, blue shield that doesn't make any sense to me. I guess it was simply a way to get that blue somewhere in the logo. But how about this concept - a ten minute tweaking by jl murtagh on the Sportslogos.net forums. So much better, so much cleaner, improved upon by an amateur.
While that eliminates the unnecessary shield, two major problems still exist. First, the lettering. It's pretty obvious to me that they selected this logo long ago and left the name banner blank so they could fill it in when the time came to name the team. That being the case, the logo doesn't reflect the name Sounders at all and the lettering itself if just a basic font with just a tiny bit of embellishment. Nothing interesting or unique or eye-catching or marketable. Just a name, in normal font. Whoopee.
But what gets me the most is the design of the Space Needle. It is so basic, so cheap, that I'd expect to find better in the touristy gift shops that are in the Seattle Center. In fact, I'm sure I can probably find the same design on one of those three t-shirts for $9.99 table.
What I didn't think about last night is the missed opportunity that this logo represents. This could've and should've been so much better. This is a weak effort and whoever designed it can't really be proud of it. I bet it ended up being a logo by committee, and no logo looks right after that process.
As it stands now, this isn't an ugly logo, just a poorly designed one and it would've been no matter what name filled that banner.
Team: Seattle Sounders
League: Major League Soccer
Location: Seattle, Washington
Stadium: Qwest Field
Labels: Soccer, Washington
posted by Brandon @ 11:49 PM
14 Comments:
Like you, I'm thrilled that Seattle gets to have our "Sounders" - but, unlike you, I'm not willing to excuse this lame-ass logo.
It's a clutzy mish-mash of conflicting, confusing, and overbearing shapes that bury the name of the club and doesn't lend itself well to branding or merchandising. To top it all off, technically it has poor design hierarchy and doesn't properly create the illusion of any depth to separate the elements. Overall, it's a big disappointment to me. There was a real opportunity here for something refined, interesting, and elegant that was completely missed.
I slept on it and I think Dave is right, I don't like this logo. It's a big, huge missed opportunity. I'll be updating my review later in the day.
I think you've hit the nail on the head, and I was careful not to lay the entire blame on the design firm (DNA Mechanics, which has some amazing work to their credit). It's hard to do a good job of communicating a brand properly when you have to come up with a generic logo that can accommodate an unknown "product name."
That doesn't make it any less a shame for the Sounders, however, who are now stuck with this crappy logo.
As are we.
In the end what matters is what John Q. Public thinks...and one poll on Big Soccer with almost 400 votes cast has the logo getting thumbs up from 68% of the voters.
GS-1 - I'm not surprised at that poll. It's not an ugly logo, necessarily. But it could be sooooooo much better. 68% could easily have been 90%.
The blue shield looks like Superman's underpants, which makes the Sounders shield look like an athletic supporter, which makes the Space Needle look like a ... never mind.
Your version is much cleaner and I like it. The name in a tag across the shield seems too cheap and kind of an after thought. Wish they would have incorporated the name around the shield or on a banner above that is part of shield like Barcelona. Anyway good work.
I could not agree more with your assessment. You know what this reminds me of? Clip Art.
I know the agency who designed it. And "designed by committee" is 100% correct. There's an overall lack of creative enthusiasm there. I agree, it's not ugly, just poorly designed.
I think that the logo is ugly and should be redesigned. It's great that we have a team, now a great logo would be great.
Love this. Happy new year, and a great 2011!
Helo, your blog is really good, I like it very much!
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