Logos are everywhere. Because of this, only a few can rise among the noise — and often it’s the more unique logos that are most memorable. Sometimes to be unique, you’ve also got to be weird. In this post, we showcase twenty lovably strange logos that work.
Society 27
The Society 27 logo by Pavel Pavlov makes use of the fantastic ambigram effect, which ensures the logo display exactly the same when viewed in an upside down position. The abstract use of the quotation marks and number seven cleverly make up the complete 27.
London Symphony Orchestra
The LSO logo uses a single flowing line to create the three initials of the London Symphony Orchestra. The semi-representational shapes are recognisable enough to be seen as letters, but also allows the logo on a whole to be seen as an elegant graphic.
I love NY
The simple yet highly recognisable mark of the I Love New York has been used to promote tourism in New York for years. Known as a Rebus logo, it displays a large red heart graphic to symbolise the word love, while representing the word New York with the two initials N and Y.
Museum of London
The new Museum of London logo first appears to be a collation of current logo design trends, but with deeper inspection and research the underlying meaning of the logo is discovered. The organic shapes that make up the logo represent the history of London, showing its growth over time expanding geographically.
Metroplex
The Metroplex logo by BrandBerry creates an excellent sense of depth with the use of three dimensional shapes. The array of cuboid shapes represent skyscraper buildings which make up the overall metropolis graphic, linking well to the meaning behind the name.
Cattleyard
Another logo that links well to its name and subject is that of Cattleyard Promotions. Being a music related business the logo uses various graphics of instruments but combines them to form the overall shape of a cow, bringing together these two inspirations into a unique mark.
CafeClick
The CafeClick logo uses an accepted icon of the internet, the mouse cursor and brings it together with a mug of coffee by replacing the steam. This cleverly links these two elements making a brilliant logo for an internet café.
Logo Motives
The Logo Motives brand that represents designer Jeff Fisher is an admirable collation of imagery and letterforms. The manipulation of the letters O and G allow them to fit seamlessly into the overall train graphic with perfect geometrics all round.
Rehabilitation Hospital Corporation of America
The highly symbolic logo of the Rehabilitation Hospital Corporation of America logo communicates a complex message with just a simple design. Using the globally renown cross symbol to represent help and medical attention and the steps to reflect on the steps taken back to normal life.
Schizophrenic
Another logo that plays in representational symbols while relating heavily to the brand name is the Schizonphrenic logo. Being a medical disorder that often depicts split personalities the logo characterises this with simple shapes that depict a happy and sad face.
Curious
The word curious often goes hand in hand with questions, this is smartly represented in the Curious logo by Action Designer. Using the question mark symbol depicts this while being manipulated to fit into the logo by replacing the letter C.
Modern Nerd
The Modern Nerd logo makes fine use of negative space to fool the eye into seeing the overall image of a figure, using just the symbolic shapes of hair, glasses and tie it links in well to the stereotypical geek/nerd image.
Time Watch
The Time Watch logo brings in elements from daily life to enhance the meaning of the logo. The colon is commonly used on digital clocks and watches, in the logo it is cunningly used to replace the letter I giving a great looking and representative mark.
Full Time
Taking on a more lateral depiction of the brand is the Full Time logo, this mark takes a clock as the symbol of time and uses it as a container of water to represent time being full.
Upside Down
The clever execution of the Upside Down logo maintains legibility by manipulating select letters to represent the brand name. By using alternate letters or flipping the orientation of a letter gives an unusual appearance despite being easily reabable.
Candy
The combination of two images into one is what makes the Candy logo so great. Using both a stereotypical sweet product and an illustration of a girl’s head link in well to the nature of the product. Even the wording blends in to become part of the artwork.
Seven and Six
The geometric layout of the Seven and Six logo creates a groovy looking mark that also acts as the graphical alternative of the brand name. Using the numeric figures and the ampersand reinforce the complete worded variations. The logo was designed by John Gerlach.
Studio Eight
The flowing lines of the Studio 8 logo create an illusion that allows both the initial S and number 8 to be visible in the logo graphic. Splitting the lines at the appropriate places stops the eye from following the curves in order for each symbol to appear.
Zip
The three letters of the Zip logo are blended together to form an almost solid shape. The centre graphic which represents the real life object also holds together the logo by breaking up the block allowing the letter I to be seen as well as allowing the Z and P to become legible.
Bison
The Bison logo by Seamus Leonard is an excellent example of how letters of a word can be distorted to create a completely different shape to reinforce its meaning while maintaining readability.
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By Chris Spooner
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thanks, congrats
Those are really ‘different’ – I loved the ‘museum of london’ one
those are’nt weird. just well designed.
London Symphony Orchestra…
You failed to mention that the logo as a whole is reminiscent of a conductor conducting. That why it works.
Very creative
Wow! The Candy logo is amazing
It was mentioned upthread, but the Bison logo is in fact very similar to the Great Falls High School logo, which they have been using for around 30 years.
if one more person says something about schizophrenia i am going to stab myself in the face with a graphics tablet pen. These are cool logos, thanks for putting them together. I have been following your blog here and there, some cool stuff. thanks.
Seven and Six – Great work!
More >> http://gammaidentity.ru/record/64/
Wow, great collection.
Logo’s today are becoming more ingenious than ever before. My belief is: the simpler the better.
Hey.. Lemme tell you something, your blog looks great and it has some really great content, including this.
Subscribing to your RSS aswell
cheers
THAT’S NOT SCHIZOPHRENIA
IT’S A CONDUCTOR
NOW I’M HALF OF THE COMMENTERS ON THIS PAGE
Love your selection. The images are all very playful and evocative. Logos should be fun to be memorable
By Far, the TOP 3 logos on this page are;
1. Rehabilitation Hospital Corporation of America
2. LSO
3. Society 27
All three are very unique, simple, clean, highly recognizable, would produce well, highly effective and conceptually AMAZING!
don’t forget turn the upsidedown 180!! 180!! the horror, its a totally different thing
I love the upside down logo. It is so effective by simply inverting two characters.
LOVE the upside down logo.
T:me makes me slap myself with a ‘wish I’d thought of that’ !
Thanks for the list.
you gotta laugh at the people saying these are not good logos, like the guy who has been doing it for 40 years, show us your work, go ahead,
what a stuck up ass you are, ive met plenty of your type, cant produce the goods yoruself but love to critique, and the guy listing famous brands saying they work and these dont because he hasnt seen them, hahahah, too much, you are talking about personal recognition, not any other value, the reason that any logo ‘works’ under this definition is essentially repetition, promotion, advertising, they dont ‘work’ they just become part of your brain, look into how the brains pathways are formed and reinforced and theres your answer. The list has some awesomely clever ideas, i have my favorites which are just a matter of taste of course, have to agree with a bunch of people though, cant see how they are weird though. Another title would have been preferable.
Love the Rehabilitation Hospital Corporation of America logo!
Thanks for the list.
’shopped.
The logos are fanatastic. I like all of when, the logo of the candy is the worst.
http://www.icositetrahedron.com
wow. amazing logos
Hey did you know schizophrenia is commonly confused with split personality disorder?
The author did not make any of these logos people. And on another site the creator of the logo explained he just slapped schizophrenic on their because people commonly associate split personality with it.
And ‘weird’ can simply mean unusual or out-of-the-ordinary. Quit being such literal fckin pricks.
How about the FedEx logo? Can’t believe how many people have never noticed that cool little arrow.
Some nice stuff in here, but the article is terribly written, and there’s no particular consistency to the theme or context of these logos. Some are personal, some are corporate, some are for theoretical purpose, some are for actual business purposes.
Why it has lots of diggs?
I’m sorry but i disagree in Cattleyard’s logo. It’s too complex, hard to recognize, can’t be appreciated in small size, it’s not everything that a logo should be. And Bison’s logo is wierd, it’s true, but I don’t know what company it represents, so I can’t judge it right. What I see is that the “S” could be mistaken for a “g” and the logo seems a little childish.
Here I found another two Bison’s Logos:
http://www.bison.com.mx/
http://www.bison.co.uk/
OK, OK. I just found my Schizophrenic logo here and the dozens of comments on it.
I definitely had no intentions of having this logo make fun of the schizophrenic disorder and I deeply apologize to those who I have offended. I came up with the concept and figured that schizophrenic would be the most recognized name to go with it.
I guess it would have been more ‘correct’ to call it “Dissociative Identity Disorder”. This logo is NOT currently associated with any company at the moment and is for sale on IncSpring.com. Thus, if this logo is used for an actual identity someday it most likely won’t have the word ’schizophrenic’ tagged to it.
That’s cool… so when I make a logo of a pile of crap and call it “Christianity”, I’ll just assume that they’ll change the name later.
Lame.
nice article .. you can add wacom logo in this ..
grt article… thanks…
I really like the Bison logo, but it just bugs me that the bison is missing a front leg. The more I look at it, the more annoyed I am by it.
Excellent Post! Thanks for this! For more inspiration check out 50 Inspirational Logo Designs
When you read through this list of comments, it’s obvious why people hate graphic designers. HOW many people have to mention the schitzophrenia thing? HOW MANY people need to point out the “conductor” shape in there…
…perhaps the commentary is banal, but YOU ALL READ IT, and you all were moved to comment! Mission accomplished!
bizarre list. some of this are amazing, others are downright horrid.
this is great!
Upside Down is my favorite….
Nice collection.
Can any of these commentors read? Yes, it’s a conductor and schitzo doesn’t mean split personality
omg i can’t believe no one else has taken note of a clear rip off of dude’s logo on DA for the Schizophrenic logo. they look exactly the same
The LSO logo is absolutely brilliant. Yes, it’s flowy and beautiful. And yes, everyone has pointed out the conductor. But I can also see the bottom of an eighth note. Not sure if that part’s as intentional as the conductor, but it just adds more meaning to it. Genius. Pure genius.
i like’em all, very creative logos
Stunningly creative these logo designs are.. In fact, i do not find these weird at all rather these are fueled by imagination and absolutely mind blowing.. I loved the Cattleyard, CafeClick, and Upsidedown designs.. these are excellent..
Nice logos Chris , but why is Logomotives logo weird? I like all of when, the Rehabilitation Hospital logo is the worst.
)
the bison logo doesn’t seem that original, considering it was my HIGH SCHOOLS LOGO! See:
http://thecoacho.com/2005%20PROFILES/KELLYCONNERS.htm
great selection
contract with me.
polok_shikha@yahoo.com
The simplicity and formality of the logos are great. This gives me plenty typography ideas
Th simplicity of these logos is crazy, but beautiful at the same time. Very inspirational as well.
Maybe because they keep their promise as a big brand
very nice collection here! Metroplex and logomotives are superb.
Modern Nerd & Time watch are my favs …great work to all