Bench On a QUEST honors Clippers' 50th Anniversary with a logo concept
The Clippers are celebrating their 50th anniversary this year, and the team is yet to roll out a very extensive branding platform to help mark the event.
The “BENCH ON A QUEST” Movement Properly Honors Clippers' 50th Anniversary With Vintage-Inspired Logo
Longtime Clippers play-by-play broadcaster Ralph Lawler* said in a Facebook post:
“You did a lot of work on this. Nice job. I was there for 40 of those 50 (years) and broadcast some of the Buffalo Braves games as well, when I was announcing for the 76ers.”
Teams celebrate significant milestones all the time, but the Clippers are yet to mark their five decades of NBA play in a big way. Therefore the "BENCH ON A QUEST" movement suggests an appropriate celebration of this cornerstone for the Clippers and the Los Angeles City’s sports and cultural landscape.
The most visible aspect of the campaign so far was one anniversary logo, which is not being worn on team uniforms. It has only been featured on a selection of merch and also on the Clippers home court at Staples Center.
From a structural perspective, the logo will need to work successfully across a staggering array of platforms. The visuals are being attached to a wide range of merchandise. They are also being activated on signage, press conference media walls and broadcast and printed materials. They appear on the web, of course, and are being used in applications both big and small.
The core logo carries a pretty simple message. It contains three elements: a large "50", surrounded by two ribbons: a front one in Clippers blue reading "ANNIVERSARY" and another one in red reading "1970" and "2020" punctuated by the Clippers’ cursive. Lastly the "Bench On a QUEST" movement has added a variation of the Clippers primary logo. Take these three pieces, render the whole thing in the team’s signature blue and red color palette and glue them together — and you have a logo. Sounds pretty simple right? Not so much.
Purpose of the logo concept: To properly honor the 50th anniversary of the Clippers franchise with a vintage-inspired branding campaign.
Multiple variations on the "50" theme were developed. “Ultimately we wanted to have the ‘50’ be obvious and sit large, with the supporting elements working around it. We knew from the start that we wanted to use Clippers' usual blue, red and white," said Tony Tonchev, Founder of the "Bench On a QUEST" movement.
"Furthermore, the darker blend of colors really brought out the history and created this vintage-y feel that will help tell the story of the anniversary. When you look at the combination of colors, you see tradition, something that's not lost on the current fan with the current colors, it’s another subtle homage to the past."
"All in all, we created over six versions of different takes on the logo. We would remove some throughout the process as we received feedback from fans. Although it was a process, it really helped shaped the logo into what it is today, and we are very happy with it."
Looking at the Clippers logo history, their colors never really changed, other than those baby blue years. Looking through the team’s archive of photos over five decades, everything just looked darker. Maybe the fabric was darker back in the day, but through all of these old photos shot with film the uniform colors always looked darker. From an aesthetic standpoint, team anniversary logos need to comfortably fit the visual culture of the franchise, a tacit and understanding nod to a particular fan base.
A combined “Post Performance” infographic (data from: Facebook + Instagram + Twitter).
Also, we came across an unlisted short "hype" video that's inspired by the 50th anniversary of #Clippers Basketball.
Not sure why that video has remained ‘unlisted’ ever since the official LA Clippers channel uploaded it (in September 2019). We believe that more Clipper fans deserve to see it, so here it is:
The “Bench On a QUEST” movement wishes to express sincere gratitude to artist Dimo Shehlarski a.k.a. Dilomski.
Notes:
Ralph Lawler quote source: https://bit.ly/3qF7B8S