So not too long ago, Gap unveiled its new logo and brand identity, only to recently just switch back in response to overwhelmingly negative public response.
Personally I think the new logo is horrible and like the old logo much better. They switched to plain Helvetica font and a little blue gradient box in the top right. Their reasoning was that this logo change reflected a more modern, updated brand image. Apparently no one likes it though, and the logo got a real bashing online, particularly in the design community.
To make matters even worse, Gap announced a “crowd-sourcing” project where they were going to solicit designs from you (us, the people)! This is known in the design industry as spec work, where basically Gap gets a whole bunch of different logos designed for them without paying anything. Actually, it’s even worse than spec work because with spec work someone still gets paid.
Spec work is extremely frowned upon by most designers. It’s like asking different contractors to build you a house, and then you choose the one you like most and only pay for that one. Ridiculous right? Well some people seem to think this is okay in the design industry. You can look up “spec work” if you want to learn more. Of course this put the design community in further uproar about the whole Gap logo topic.
If they wanted to modernize the logo, I think they could’ve just switched to a sans-serif font or maybe designed a custom font. Doesn’t shake things up too much and keeps the iconic Gap logo. I do think in general sans-serif just looks sleeker than a serif font. I bet a bunch of executives chose the new logo. To me “Gap” in that letter case just looks so bad in bold Helvetica. The gradient box is just kind of lame as well. Very cliched in the same way that the term “Web 2.0” is. There is absolutely nothing distinctive or memorable about the new (now trashed) logo.
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