The Google Logo in the Making
Author of this post: Kevin Kelly | About Blog Authors »
Unless you’ve been living under a rock for the past decade, you are no doubt familiar with Google’s logo. It’s a deceptively simple mark. In fact, it almost seems non-designed. Of course, that’s not actually the case. Not at all.
Ruth Kedar is the designer responsible for the logo, and in an interview with WebProNews, she talks at length about her process and the goals of the project. She also discusses the details. For example, she has this to say about the color choices:
The colors evoke memories of child play, but deftly stray from the color wheel strictures so as to hint at the inherent element of serendipity that creeps into any search results page…
Wired has more about the logo, including sketches of some of its earlier treatments, and Kedar again provides commentary. Together, these pieces make an interesting read. The Google logo has perhaps become more ubiquitous than any other mark, and the story of its genesis paints an interesting portrait of a certain period in web and graphic design history.
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February 14th, 2008 at 8:01 am
What a nice concept. That really impressed me. Your blog is awesome Kelly! Many thanks for it…. :)
February 15th, 2008 at 9:10 am
It’s amazing how recognisable the Google logo has become.
February 16th, 2008 at 8:37 pm
I would say Google logo is an excellent piece of artwork. Google has become synonymous to search.
Good Blog! subscribing to your rss feed.
March 22nd, 2008 at 1:02 am
Here’s a lesson in branding to remember. I remember when Google first started. Altavista was the best of the search back then. Google has become one of the worlds best known marks.
March 27th, 2008 at 5:16 pm
I believe Google is a spin on the googol which is 1 followed by one hundred zeros (in decimal representation). One googol is written as: 10,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000.
It not a silly word, I believe it represents endless possibilities
Mitch
April 30th, 2008 at 9:15 am
What I have seen these days is that whenever we have some important event or festival coming up then Google displays its logo accordingly. E.g. on St.. Patrick’s day Google’s logo was different that the usual one and it now regularly shows like this on other events as well. Basically this is a very good idea to notify the importance of the events. At least people will come to know that there’s something important today..!!!
April 30th, 2008 at 1:22 pm
what does the Google doodle for April 30, 2008 represent?
July 1st, 2008 at 1:13 am
Google is a silly word and I love the creative ideas that they come up with to change its look with the holidays, etc. Also the contests that they have for the kids to design various fun looks. Its taking on a life of its own!
February 24th, 2009 at 6:32 pm
Google’s site design and logo… simple? Probably not.
My ex-wife was a graphic designer specializing in corporate identity with OnDesign. I cannot get over just how many drafts and story boards go into design. Each small element such as a line is twisted and turned into various directions, lengths textures (graphically speaking); then other design elements are creatively altered as well. After that, an initial presentation is given to a board of director that chose various concepts and then those concepts are further worked on based upon feedback provided by the panel.
The process repeats itself again until many months and countless hours, not to mention everybody’s money, have been spent.
With so much talk about textual content and search engines, it’s nice to remember that someone still considers graphical design and aesthetics and must. Thanks Sessions!
Keep up the great work.
Daniel Tetreault.
July 14th, 2009 at 5:59 am
Since i always use google so it was nice to read this post on the Logo of t6he company.Thanks a lot.
December 3rd, 2009 at 2:42 am
It’s amazing how simple that logo is, yet it’s become one of the most popular corporate identities in the entire world.
It’s almost crazy to think that it’s the logo for a multi-billion dollar corporation haha
January 29th, 2010 at 12:09 pm
What I really like is the google doodle concept. This gives the logo an entertaining footprint.
Ok, this is blasphamous ;-) Never shown Google Doodles -> http://www.tagseoblog.de/never-shown-google-doodle-1-inofficial
Greetings, Martin