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More interesting for the HN crowd I think is the article from the actual design company that did the redesign: https://www.pentagram.com/work/slack https://www.
by SCdF 8y ago
More interesting for the HN crowd I think is the article from the actual design company that did the redesign: https://www.pentagram.com/work/slack https://www.pentagram.com/work/slack
- bluetidepro 8y agoAt first I thought this was interesting, mainly because of all the design talent that is at Slack already. But then I realized, it was probably just an easier move to get an outside company to do it and make it a lot less political than had it been done in-house at Slack. And well, Pentagram is also huge, to be fair.
- christkv 8y agoDid they identify more like a gazelle, jaguar or leopard.
- mythz 8y agoAgreed, they have a pretty impressive and aesthetically pleasing portfolio: https://www.pentagram.com/work/ https://www.pentagram.com/work/
- sf_rob 8y agoWow, the hovering rapid image preview are really annoying.
- giarc 8y agoYet at the same time, some of the logos in the Slack work are really bad. https://pentagram-production.imgix.net/618d5092-a542-4dae-bd27-a3afb4bcc12d/mb_slack_04.jpg?w=2000&fm=jpg&q=70&auto=format https://pentagram-production.imgix.net/618d5092-a542-4dae-bd... One is just colons added to the name and the wave emoji. The one beside it looks like it's from a 1997 tech company. The whole bottom row seems like it should be titled "We created these to show what not to do."
- rahkiin 8y agoWith these I always feel like they just made some shitty ones after the job was finished just for the ‘look we did a whole design and thought out of the box’ articles like these
- blotter_paper 8y agoMore likely, they had a pile of shitty drafts that they cleaned up slightly for the same purpose. In a process like this, a pile of shitty drafts is pretty much a given. You're exploring a range of possibilities, and if you're too self-critical during brainstorming you might not sketch out the draft that becomes your best submittal.
- Scown 8y agoClassic agency tactic, pitch two good ideas and eight bad ones... Client gets the illusion of choice and the agency gets creative control.
- fermienrico 8y agoPaula needs to retire. She has ruined the Library of Congress logo - the classic Library of Congress logo by C&G&H with this crap: https://www.pentagram.com/work/library-of-congress/story https://www.pentagram.com/work/library-of-congress/story It's like they recycled left overs from the EFF logo job. Pentagram is hit or miss depending on who leads the project. Michael Beirut is one of the better partners and designers at Pentagram.
- gamma-male 8y agoThat's quite a reaction you're having here.
- fermienrico 8y ago:-) This stuff bothers me. Like the day when they changed the legendary Vignelli's American Airlines logo : https://www.businessinsider.com/the-new-american-airlines-logo-is-a-travesty-2014-1 https://www.businessinsider.com/the-new-american-airlines-lo... WHY change a logo which has served, embedded and part of the company's soul for over 40 years no less, especially if it was designed by someone like Vignelli. It blows my mind.
- toomuchtodo 8y agoBecause it gives them something to do.
- QML 8y agoWhile both the Library of Congress and American Airline logos are iconic, they look fairly outdated and aren't as flexible. Look at the new Library of Congress logo [1], and think if that could've been done with the older one. [1] https://www.pentagram.com/work/library-of-congress#23433 https://www.pentagram.com/work/library-of-congress#23433
- fermienrico 8y agoTimeless design (Swiss typography, Braun industrial design, Muller-Brockmann's grid system, Ando's architecture) - they're timeless because they don't follow trends or try to catch up with current fads - they're built from fundamentals and aesthetic sensibilities that appeal universally. They look "outdated" because everything else around it is following current trends. You cannot ever say the Coca Cola logo is outdated, nor can you ever say the LOC logo by C&G&H is outdated. If anything else, it is advantageous to be constant and "outdated" (there are exceptions such as Fashion brands). Regarding flexibility - I agree. But, most companies understand the value of their decades old brand - see recent tweaks of the Lufthansa logo, American Express or MasterCard - they tweak them for future compatibility and digital media. They don't just throw it out the window without good reason. "Outdatedness" is not a good reason.
- jahlove 8y agoIn case you miss the link to the background story: https://www.pentagram.com/work/slack/story https://www.pentagram.com/work/slack/story
- walrus01 8y agoI much prefer the (hopefully satirical) Pepsi Gravitational Field [2008] https://www.goldennumber.net/wp-content/uploads/pepsi-arnell-021109.pdf https://www.goldennumber.net/wp-content/uploads/pepsi-arnell...
- atombender 8y agoReading this without context, it's actually completely unclear to me whether it's satire or serious.
- Exuma 8y agoWhat do you think it cost to get this slack logo designed from a company that prestigious? I see they also did rolls royce
- teej 8y ago$100-250k range given this includes logo, brand identity, motion design, comprehensive visual design system.
- i386 8y agobased on my experience a corporate rebrand is the US is closer to $500k
- acdha 8y agoFrom a big-name shop like Pentagram? I'd expect that to be higher.
- ryanSrich 8y agoNo. It'd be closer to $1m.
- enra 8y agoSeconded. In these type of high visibility projects and prestigious consulting companies usually charge in hundreds of thousands and in millions for a single deliverable (narrative document, logo, brand). The whole process might months to a year with several people involved from the agency.
- peetahb 8y agoAnywhere from $100k to $1m; their partner Michael Beirut was involved, so I would guess it's on the higher end of the scale.
- FormerNYer 8y agoA partner is involved in every Pentagram engagement though. Pentagram is not really like a huge Landor-esque firm, it's basically a series of small design consultancies each led by a partner that are loosely tied together. So anything that Pentagram is gonna do, at least one of the partners has to get behind it. In some ways I guess that makes it very loosely like a VC fund.
- mstade 8y agoA lot of those “logo explorations for the octothorpe” look like swastikas to me, including the final shape. Basic shape I suppose, easy to find in most any circular-comprised-of-geometric-shapes kind of design, but still imagery you’d probably like to avoid associating with your brand. Still, I love these kinds of process breakdowns. Having been involved in writing a few of my own, I know there’s probably a lot of pretentious nonsense to fill in the blanks (i.e. designers mess around a lot when working) but still it’s a nice read, short as it is.
- sleepybrett 8y agoI mean there is a swastika in the negative space as hilariously pointed out but the first reply to their logo anouncement on twitter. le'woops
- Arn_Thor 8y agoI was playing around with the logo for my company, which features a configuration of overlapping boxes. A significant percentage of my brainstorming iterations ended up as swastika-esque shapes. Go figure.. Now I'm not a designer at all, just fiddling around, but those versions ended up in a not-to-be-opened folder immediately, because.. of course it shouldn't see the light of day! That's a bad association waiting to happen But Pentagram didn't let that stop them, did they. Guess that's why they get paid the big bucks