150 People Attempt to Draw World’s Famous Logos Completely From Memory

Famous Company Logos

Can you remember what the IKEA logo looks like? Could you draw the Starbucks mermaid without peeking? That’s the challenge that Signs.com gave to 156 Americans. In half an hour’s time, they were asked to recreate 10 famous company logos completely from memory. The results, called Branded in Memory, are fascinating; they demonstrate the wide range in which people recall some of the world’s most popular brands.

After all of the logos were drawn, Signs.com arranged them in a chart that shows an array from the least to most accurate recreations. The iterations that were the farthest from the actual thing over simplified the branding or added things that weren’t there in the first place. Many people, for instance, included a stalk on the Apple logo—but it doesn’t have one. Others added too many rings to the bullseye of the Target icon, or forgot to include their name with it. Target, however, fared much better Foot Locker or Domino's Pizza, who had less than half their logos drawn correctly.

Of all the challenges with this exercise, there’s one aspect of branding that was consistently done correctly: color. Not matter how askew the image itself was, 80% of participants selected the right hues for these logos. It shows that this characteristic shouldn’t be underestimated—often, it’s the most memorable part of the identity.

Signs.com challenged 156 people to draw 10 famous company logos from memory.

Starbucks

Famous Company Logos

 

Target

Famous Company Logos

 

IKEA

Famous Company Logos

 

The results are fascinating and show that some logos, like Foot Locker, are harder to remember than others.

Foot Locker

Famous Logos Drawn from Memory

 

7-11

Memorable Logos

 

Domino's Pizza

Famous Logos Drawn from Memory

 

Apple

Memorable Logos

 

Burger King

Famous Logos Drawn from Memory

 

Adidas

Memorable Logos

 

Walmart

Famous Company Logos

Signs.com: Website
h/t: [kottke.org, Creative Bloq]

All images via Signs.com.

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Sara Barnes

Sara Barnes is a Staff Editor at My Modern Met, Manager of My Modern Met Store, and co-host of the My Modern Met Top Artist Podcast. As an illustrator and writer living in Seattle, she chronicles illustration, embroidery, and beyond through her blog Brown Paper Bag and Instagram @brwnpaperbag. She wrote a book about embroidery artist Sarah K. Benning titled 'Embroidered Life' that was published by Chronicle Books in 2019. Sara is a graduate of the Maryland Institute College of Art. She earned her BFA in Illustration in 2008 and MFA in Illustration Practice in 2013.
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