Which GGWash logo ideas you liked and hated
Hundreds of you filled out our survey about potential logos. Thank you! Here’s what you said.
Here are your ratings from the survey. The bars show how many of each score a logo got. A 1 was the lowest score, 5 the highest. Let’s discuss each option in turn.
The rebus
The “no-build” option was a variant of our current logo, two “greater than” signs and a George Washington head. We call this the “rebus,” since it’s a graphical depiction of “greater, greater, Washington.”
This was the most controversial. It got the greatest number of 1s (the worst rating), but also more 5s than all but the two “nested G” options. This had the highest standard deviation in the responses (a measure of how much the responses spread out versus cluster together) but also the second-lowest average.
People who liked it:
- The best part about this, compared to the rest, is that it clearly shows the connection to Washington.
- Punny, clever. Understandable without the map in the background.
- Unique and you know what it is without knowing the logo prevously
- Has character. why does it need to look corporate??
- No build - I’m a pearl-clutching NIMBY who hates logo change
People who hated it:
- George Washington represents DC’s past - this blog is all about DC’s future
- I think the greater symbolism is lost and the george is tacky.
- Like a puzzle for 3rd-graders
- Too intricate and slightly violent
- Never. Just don’t. Stop. Put down the alcohol.
Overall conclusion: There’s definitely something cute and fun here, but too many people either don’t get this or react negatively to having George.
Just chevrons
A lot of people call us “Greater Greater.” What about just ditching the George?
People who liked it:
- Very clever, looks good at the top
- Adequate. Best choice here
- Clean, simple. Keep the old one around since this one makes more sense if it’s got the old one to refer to. [This person also liked the rebus.]
People who hated it:
- Command prompt? Sharrows? (Hate sharrows)
- Lacks context without supporting words.
- No connection to DC
- I think that if you go with this concept, you would always have to include the the words - I don’t think it’s an effective stand alone logo.
I actually think our format of voting on the Twitter icon version was most unkind to this logo. All logos would have a number of variations: there’s the “wordmark” that includes words, an icon to use on Twitter, on the browser tabs (a “favicon”), etc., and others. On the actual site, we’ll use whatever image we pick in context with the name, and this one seems to shine the most when it’s part of the name, like this:
We only gave you the icons themselves to avoid confusing things with fonts, sizes, bold, etc. which we weren’t trying to ask about right now, but I wonder if that left this one twisting in the wind.
Unequal chevrons
This variant uses unequal chevrons to connote motion. This placed the worst, period, with both the lowest mean and lowest standard deviation (meaning people were most consistent about this one).
People who liked it:
- Simple yet interesting because of the two different sizes. Clever and poignant.
- Clean and simple.
People who hated it:
- Weird and unrecognizable
- I don’t know what this stands for. Looks like Wingdings
- Unbalanced.
- Shrinking into the future?
The one-tailed G
What about a G where the tail was a chevron or two? You rated three versions of this. Unfortunately, we always had some trouble making that G not really look like a C.
One version had just a single chevron, to look most G-like. We could also potentially make the “wordmark” use this G in the name, something like this:
People who liked it:
- This may be the best one because it’s visually simple. Would show up best on social media
- Like the forward motion implied G+>=arrow.
- The transit line G with an arrow is a strong concept.
People who hated it:
- Looks like a G, but only one arrow sort of drops the ball on ‘greater, greater’
- Looks too much like the letter “C”, and the single arrow doesn’t show the double “greater”
- Bold but bland. could be the logo of a nondescript trucking company
- Looks like a C. only one chevron seems like not enough. looks kind of corporate too
- Looks like a C, not a G - also looks very corporate
- Looks like a “C” rather than a “G”
The two-tailed G
You felt that the one with one chevron looked a lot like a C, and felt that even more strongly with the two options that had two chevrons (equal or unequal).
People who liked them:
- This is my favorite concept .. and the double arrow can be used in isolation elsewhere
- Looks like a G, and the two arrows make the ‘greater, greater’ concept come to life
- Clean and fun
People who hated them (besides everyone who said they look like Cs)
- The G anchors it to the brand, but the changing thicknesses are confusing
- I thought u-turns were illegal?
- This one gives a “hammer/sickle” feel.
The nested Gs and arrow
We also worried these looked like Cs, so this next concept nested two Gs and played with the tail to keep a little chevron-ness but not so much. This also evokes transit, to some extent, and for better or worse, looks like a logo a transportation agency might use.
People who liked it:
- My favorite of them all. I like the double chevron idea (“Greater than greater than”) but combining it with the G. Plus it evokes the lines on the Metro Rail Map.
- This is my favorite. It does not resemble Google or Colorado. It clearly has the >>. It looks like a ‘G’ and not a ‘C’, and the double line remind me of transit lines.
- Would like to see a bi color mock up. Multi color too.
People who hated it:
- Too busy, disunified
- The perceptual cues in this one are all weird.
- Looks like a C, not a G - looks like a transit system logo - if that’s what you’re going for then sure
Some people noticed that the arrowhead at the end did look a little like DC. By doing so, we could incorporate some DC symbology without having a logo that is entirely inside a DC outline. While a DC-shaped logo would be recognizable, we do not want to give the impression that the whole world is inside the District border.
But what about making the tail even more DC-like?
The nested Gs and District
This one and the arrow variant got the highest scores, with this placing slightly ahead, but very very close.
People who liked it:
- This is my favorite. Not only do you generally capture features of the GGW name, the overall logo is reminiscent of motifs that you often find in transit maps. So, in that way, this logo best captures what GGW is “about” in addition to playing with the letters/symbols.
- G’s then outline of DC is simple yet unique
- I love the suggestion of the river through the bottom of the G.
- The right part of the G almost looks like it’s supposed to be DC, which is a cool idea. Build on that! And add color!
Some other constructive feedback:
- I would have liked this the best, except that it slightly resembles Google’s logo.
- I like the shape the most, but it’s missing the arrows, which I think are important.
People who hated it:
- WAY too disjointed. Looks like the bend between Rosslyn and Foggy Bottom on a bad fan-made Metro map.
- Reminds me of Georgetown
- Waaay too much going on.
What’s next?
We’re going to take this feedback into consideration and Peter Dovak, our designer, is going to work on some more concepts. We heard that a lot of you liked the way the right-most ones incorporated a little bit of DC and some transit motifs, and maybe we can play those up even better.
I also like how a logo which includes the DC outline as part of the image, but which has part of the design outside it as well (like the arcs in these two) conveys how we have a lot about DC but also often go beyond. That way, we can evoke DC but also not be confined by it.
No matter what we do, a large contingent of people are going to say they just hate everything. We welcome that and all feedback, but also have to contend with the idea that we need to ultimately pick one (and mostly, you hate the current one). Feedback which talked about the pros and cons of images and noted elements you like was especially valuable — thank you!