Am I being too harsh? Maybe. Let’s look at the old logo, and the one that was just announced last month:
Yeah, I’m not being too harsh.
(Photo: Bugatti) The old Bugatti logo has been around in essentially the same form since 1909, when Carlo Bugatti, a jewelry maker and the father of founder Ettore Bugatti, designed it as a badge for his son’s cars. This logo/badge was known as the Macaron, and you can read it lovingly described here: It’s an iconic logo, absolutely, and I respect that it’s resisted change for so many decades. That’s not to say I don’t think changing a logo is bad – sometimes, it makes a lot of sense, and I don’t think the Bugatti logo is so precious that it shouldn’t ever be touched. But, if you’re going to touch a logo, especially one as long-lived as this one, you’d think you’d want the result to be something that, I don’t know, doesn’t look like it was done in the elevator ride up to the presentation? I don’t have a problem with simplification – I think a simple logo is often the right way to go. But there’s a difference between simplified and just plain boring. For example, what if the classic logo was simplified like this:
… or maybe even simpler:
These both evoke the color and feel of the original, but are pretty dramatically simplified while maintaining a consistent visual identity with their source. And these took me five minutes and I’m giving them out for free. Let’s look again at the one Bugatti has gone with:
Oh, come on. Sure, it’s basically the same san-serif type as the original, stripped down, but this alone just isn’t enough. It doesn’t feel spare or classy or elegant, it feels lazy. If you’re about to defend it, let me read you some of the praise heaped on the logo from Logos-World.net, which sounds like it must have originated from Bugatti’s PR department, but I can’t prove that: Who wants Bugatti to be “simple, clear, strict, and businesslike?” Have these people met Bugatti? They make cars with over 1,000 horsepower and cost over three million dollars. They’re possibly the least rational cars on the planet. Who is this logo for? Someone who spent so much on their Bugatti they can’t afford color printer ink refills? What’s the fucking point? Oh, and speaking of the lack of color, Red was too aggressive? Okay, it’s the color of blood, sure, but it’s also the color of fresh cherries and apples and roses and somehow companies like Lego haven’t thought it was “too aggressive.” But maybe the average Lego customer is just a little tougher than the average Bugatti buyer.
I thought the company was already using the new logo on their site, but then I realized that typography was just a standard web font, not a graphic at all. But for a second I wasn’t sure, which is precisely what you don’t want people who see your logo to think. How did this happen? Did a Bugatti executive drive by a Hobby Lobby in their Chiron and think, damn, how can we get some of that for our company? Anyway, congratulations on your new logo, Bugatti. Way to phone it in. Why would BUGATTI want to use the same font that Germans use everywhere for the road signage, labels on the trains and wagons, warning labels, and so forth? Alas, am I the only one here that remembers “generic” products in the 1970’s? This could almost pass for an SNL take down of that lousy trend. The praise heaped on Bugatti’s new logo is also one of the reasons that sciencey type people get annoyed by the artsy crowd. It just seems like masturbatory bullshit. This is an exclusive brand with a rich history. You don’t WANT it to be attractive to everyone, just a few thousand people with money to burn. Also, the “EB” logo isn’t just classic, it’s iconic – in fact I dare say it would take me longer to read and comprehend the word “Bugatti” than it would take to make the mental connection with the “EB” logo, which has deeply hard-wired and favorable instinctual reactions for this particular car buff. This whole simplified flat logo trend is just so boring.
