Behind the Pittsburgh Penguins’ 1992 Rebranding

One of the Hockey By Design readers alerted me to a new post from a couple days ago that gives a little bit of background in the rebranding of the Penguins logo and jerseys in 1992, after winning their first two Stanley Cups. It was put out by Vance Wright Adams, the design firm that created the redesign logo and jerseys.

And when I say “a little bit of background”, I emphasize a little bit. The firm doesn’t really get into the nitty-gritty of it, but simply gives more of a recap of the situation surrounding the new designs. Regardless, if you’re like me and love hearing anything about the background of the logo designs, it’s worth checking out (click here). The best part of the post is the short video that was produced when the logo first came out, showing more of the concepts and first drawings of the new logo than the actual post does. You can watch it below:

I’ve never been a huge fan of this Penguins logo and much prefer their current logo and colour scheme, with the Vegas gold and less corporate-looking penguin. And some of the jersey concepts that were never produced just reek of typical over-the-top early-’90s design where as many effects and elements were incorporated as possible. Like this one for example. A lot of the concepts would undoubtedly, like the logo, not still be around today.

But the weirdest concept easily goes to this jersey concept, where Two-Face would apparently get a try-out with the team. It would also be problematic as the players may have a hard time remembering whether they’re playing in Pittsburgh or not. I realize that some of these concepts were not necessarily ever meant to be seen outside of the context of the design studio and generally, anything goes within the safety of the firm’s offices, but it’s still weird.

Anyway, I hope you enjoy it, and feel free to share your favourite concept (or most hated concepts) below.