Perhaps jealous of all the publicity The Gap received when it unveiled its dopey, short-lived new logo, Urban Outfitters unveiled this beauty of its own.
What it lacks in symmetry and, well, design skill and effort, it certainly makes up for in orangeness and random curvature.
Next we’ll see whether Urban Outfitters backs down from its revamped look due to public outrage as quickly as quickly as The Gap did.
Urban Outfitters Logo [Urban Outfitters]
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um. That’s worse than the Gap atrocity.
I was wondering about that. But ya, it did not used to look this bad. I like quite of a few of their clothes but I hate the new website.
That is not snazzy at all! I hate it.
someone got printshop!
would that be the same Printshop I ran on my Commodore 64??
Mincrosoft WortArt to the rescue!!!!
And I can’t spell.
I actually thought it was on purpose until you said something…
Too bad I can’t edit!
It is too early.
That was my first thought.
That’s EXACTLY what I was thinking!
Me too.
My thoughts exactly. Except spelled a little differently, heh.
I actually tried it in Microsoft Word Art & spent about three minutes on it…and it came out pretty close:
http://twitpic.com/35m9zl
C U R V Y orangetext
Dear clothing outlets – if you design a logo that looks like it was done by the CEO’s grandkids in photoshop, then your clothing is probably too ugly for me to wear.
Yeah, that sounds like UO.
That’s so bad, it can’t possibly be real. If it is, it’s probably a publicity stunt inspired by the Gap debacle. I have to go, my eyes are burning.
Hello 1993 Word Art! I’m waiting for a company to unveil their 1986 Printshop logo
who works in these departments.. baboons?
Did they just find the words printed randomly in different magazines, cut them out, and colour them a particularly unattractive shade of orange?
Nah, they went to Wordle.
Ha! This looks like bad WordArt from Microsoft Office 97. It almost makes the abortive Gap logo look good.
WordArt was my first thought. I think it’s the curve and the difference between both words. I’m surprised they didn’t make each letter a different color!
This makes Gap look good.
This just HAS to be a stunt. God, please tell me this is a stunt…..
I’m putting in my vote for stunt, as well. They were jealous of Gap’s publicity and want their own. It is so horrendous I can only assume that’s the case!
Bingo. They saw all the free publicity Gap got and said, “We want a piece of that.” Lame!
Check out their site, almost all of the graphics are this bad (first visit, don’t know if they always have been). This has to be a joke.
You’re right. Thats the worst site I’ve ever seen by a major corporation. Its like they are TRYING to do a 1997 horrible web design throwback.
It’s hipster irony.
No, it used to be a pretty cool site. Nice fonts, everything very “shabby chic”. Pretty appeasing to the eye. It now looks like a discount outdoor outfitters site.
My thought as well. After seeing that site, I’m now assuming it’s a joke.
What? Huh? But..? No way!? Worst logo ever? I’m speechless.
Has meth destroyed the brains of all the graphic artists?
I don’t know, but it’s about time you change your avatar.
I will change it when somebody comes out with an app that lets me create a logo in the style of Urban Outfitter. In the meantime, I readily confess that I am inadept and disinterested in matters of design, color and pattern.
Everyone wants to do something that is awesome and unique and unfortunately, the best they can do is unique. Only not very. With Walgreens and Wegmans going at it for the not-very-similar W shape, and with the Dodgers hitting up that Brooklyn deli for having cursive signage … companies that want to rebrand themselves are finding fewer and fewer options while retaining readability and distinctiveness.
Perhaps, but the computer has done far more damage to the graphics industry.
I cherish my ignorance of Urban Outfitters. Can anyone tell me what the old logo looked like?
I believe it was something like this:
http://www.110livingston.net/wp-content/uploads/2007/05/urban-outfitters-shop.jpg
Clicked through to their website. Is it normally that ugly? Or is that part of the joke too?
This has to be a hoax. It HAS to be. There is no way this passed any approval chain run by anyone older than 4. Gotta be fake.
*checks urbanoutfitters.com*
MY EYES!! THEY BURN!!! AAAAAAAAAAaaaauuuuughh,
This HAS to be a publicity stunt. I do marketing with several different brands, and this is hands down the worst branding I have ever seen. I can only justify a just and loving God by assuming they’re doing this purely for the irony factor.
looks like someone spent 5 minutes using “Word Art” in MS Office.
LAME
Yesterday I couldn’t spell “deziner.” Now I is one!
Like everyone else I had to go see their website. Whats with the random floating shapes, which are also that fantasticly horrid orange color? My favorite is the half eaten sandwich at the top.
I had assumed that the logo was cropped like that to fit the formating of this site, apparently I was wrong.
Who cuts the top off of a logo like that? Maybe they saved 10% by leaving off the top?
They’re a little late to the bandwagon on this one I think.
What’d they use? Word ’97 wordart? WTF!
ha ha ha haha
Ugh, the website is “new”, too. It’s pretty ugly. I didn’t see anything wrong with the old logo and site.
Looks like they’ve decided to split into two companies, “Urban” and “Outfitters”. Separately the words don’t look too terrible (though bland), but there’s no connection between them.
eat less!
My guess is this is a stunt to parody Gap.
The rest of the text graphics on the site are just as horrible, and I can tell by the pixels.
Am I the only one out here who thinks this trend is awesome? Now I can finally fulfill my dream of becoming a graphic designer without actually going to school, or having any artistic inclinations whatsoever.
WORD Art ftw
Now hipsters have an ironically bad sign to go along with their ironic fake vintage clothing.
they’re taking the 80s throwback stuff way too far with this
Ugh that logo looks like it was made with Microsoft Word art.
It looks like a five-year old made it in MS Paint.
Also, pretty sure it’s a publicity stunt.
Hey, has anyone said it looks like Microsoft Word Art yet?
Fail. Simply fail.
Butterscotch? They must be going for publicity. Consumerist falls for their plot. Harharhar ;^)
A lot of the photos have harsh shadows, deliberately. (women’s outerwear) Is clashy the new ‘in’ style for everything?
Hell in a handbasket I tell you.
Let’s not go insulting the color orange by using its name to refer to this silly shade of yellow, Phil.
In other news, this isn’t a logo. If an 8-year-old with MS Word can create something in 45 seconds, it’s not a logo.
Doesn’t that apply to Google, as well?
That’s considered Logotype. This is a mess.
This makes the Gap logo look brilliant by comparison.
Publicity stunt or not, whomever put this together must have been laughing their arse off. No designer would do this with a straight face.
The Gap’s problem was that they tried to replace an iconic image.
Urban Outfitters didn’t have an iconic or even consistent image. I’ve seen so many variants and had to Google for the old ones.
Is there some school out there producing these (either marketing or graphic arts) idiots making these awful designs? I really think this one is worse than The Gap logo was.
The logo out of context looks like a joke (maybe a “hey Gap you’re out of touch” slam) but it’s not. If you look at their website it fits in perfectly with their 90s design.
And since 90s style has been popular with post-hipsters for a few years now it’s perfect timing to push it to early-adopter/early-majority hipsters. For a company trying to be “cheap” fashion retail leaders this fits perfectly–as long as they don’t mind rebranding in 5 months; which brings me to my next point.
The only problem I see with this new look is that they just took their “timeless” branding and made it a very specific trend that will last tops 2 years. From a branding standpoint this seems kinda odd, but maybe their willing to wipe their brand and start new every other year. Not sure if that will be confusing or a great advantage to their brand. Maybe both.
Want free publicity? Make a crappy logo for yourself! Ta-Da!
Bingo. Look at how many people are reacting to this. Instant buzz. Instant attention. Brand recognition. Eyeballs. And all you have to do is toss out a mediocre logo, and then “fix” it a couple of weeks later. Cheap viral is the new black.
Are you sure it’s their new logo, because, if you’re like me and go to the site a lot, almost every other week they have a new “design” up there, changing the logo, font, styling, etc..
Besides the image on their homepage, is there a document that states this is an official, honest to god, new logo, or can I safely assume this is just one of their “logo of the half-month”?
Are you sure it’s their new logo, because, if you’re like me and go to the site a lot, almost every other week they have a new “design” up there, changing the logo, font, styling, etc..
Besides the image on their homepage, is there a document that states this is an official, honest to god, new logo, or can I safely assume this is just one of their “logo of the half-month”?
someone knows MS Word!
ya I noticed this a couple of days ago when I went on there. I instantly turned the computer to someone else and said “LOOK AT THIS!”
If you refresh the page, an alternate logo appears for a moment. But the file name says 2007, so even more confused. http://www.urbanoutfitters.com/urban/images/2007_holiday/uo_logo.gif
Looks like a captcha