I came across a blog site today that has an interesting section critiquing logos. The interesting part about it, is that all the logos mentioned, discussed and shown are based on the use of the spiral. I had not run across this phenomenon before of collecting examples of commonly themed logos.

Zeldman eloquently presents the rise and fall of the promise of design on the web in an article from 2000. A whole section is devoted to the spiral logo.

I, myself have been guilty of using the spiral in my design work. I have used the spiral and the golden mean in logos and as imagery in photo montages.

The appeal to designers to use the spiral in various forms, comes from its inherent place in nature and the harmononic resolution it provides. Something about it just feels right. This concepts is the basis of the book

The Power of Limits: Proportional Harmonies in Nature, Art, and Architecture by Gyorgy Doczi and elements of the spiral as related to the Golden Mean are taught to designers as they pass through art school. It is the basis of a discipline in mathematics and is present as the foundation of some of our most famous architecture throughout history.

In print design, well proportioned pages are designed based on the golden mean proportions. The Elements of Typographic Style by Robert Bringhurst has a whole chapter devoted to the Golden Section and its application to page design and grid structure. I believe these mathematical formulas could be applied to web page design. Using this type of approach to web pages could create a site that "feels" better and more effectively designed than the norm. Would be an interesting experiment.

Comments

While I agree with incorporating mathmatical and architectural sytems into design, I must question the statement that with the golden section, "Using this type of approach to web pages could create a site that 'feels' better and more effectively designed than the norm." Do feeling and functionality marry in such an easy way to create an effective form?

The form web sites or any designs take should be intrinsic from the content you are communicating, otherwise you're searching for how a proportional system created for construction of vases and architectural buildings in the 4th and 5th Centuries BC can be used to create "harmony."