Ever come across a logo that you jut couldn’t figure out? One that, no matter how hard you tried, never made sense?

I inherited just such a logo with my work on this collaborative blog, OwenBloggers:

In the six months I have been in grad school, I have been at a total loss as to what the hell that thing in the middle of the “O” is. People have postulated that its a ghost, a seed, a zygote even that it’s possibly a rendering of the shape of Vanderbilt’s business school building.

This weekend, I finally figured it out. Take away the “O” itself and you get this:

If you look at it, its really a interesting way of depicting a leaf. Putting it inside the “O” creates an optical illusion where you think you have to look at the white to see the shape but it’s actually the other way around.

To retain some consistency in branding, I am going to keep the logo around. In fact, I think I can get some mileage out of creating a story behind the logo. The point still stands; if you can avoid it, stay away from abstract logos…unless you want people to think your company’s mascot is a zygote.

Technorati Tags: OwenBloggers, Logos