Letterforms as Circuits

4 vintage logos with letterforms resembling electronic circuits. (Each one, enclosed in a circle)

Not as circuitous as they might be, but the simpler the circuitry the more legible the typography.

W. Paul Rand’s 1959 Westinghouse logo (and McFarland Studio’s 1973 logo for photographer, Hank Gans) we’ve mentioned before. (See: The Westinghouse W: connecting the dots)

This logo featured the letter “W” made up of three dots and four lines that form a letter with the suggestion of the format of an electrical circuit board.

Stephen Eskilson, Graphic Design: A New History

H. I readily concede that the Hank Gans logo might resemble a button even more than an electronic circuit. (See also: the Gap’s “Logo” logo)

S. Carl Seltzer’s logo design for United Semiconductor, published in a 1967 issue of Communications Arts. (from: Sandi Vincent’s Flickr Photostream)

E. The logo for Elton (an electrical products company) was designed by Jan Hollender.

(a couple more letterforms as circuits, after the fold…)

The XYZ logo was designed by Selame Design in 1965 for a venture capital firm. (Try to find out more about this “XYZ” firm and I guarantee you will be frustrated by the propensity of financial textbooks using hypothetical “XYZ” companies as examples.)

The N logo is a trademark if The Nielsen Company. At least one source says that it was designed by Landor. If so, their more recent rebranding of Nielsen appears to be overshadowing that fact.

Also related, is a project where typographic circuitry is not metaphorical, but functional.

In his 2014 paper, Touch Here to Begin: Paper Interfaces and Legible Circuits, Matthew Wizinsky outlines a new medium in which printed letters are also circuits.

As the reader touches individual letterforms or words, the finger closes a circuit that triggers different media events. Touch a letter to activate textual documents, images, videos, or audio.

… Creating legible letterforms that are also functional circuit switches – or letters that work as printed buttons – shapes a new area for typographic research by defining functional requirements specific to this purpose. Yet within these parameters, there are endless possibilities for developing appropriately meaningful and expressive designs. In this work, technical and aesthetic decisions are necessarily one and the same. For the typographic designer, this is an exciting, new, and wide-open field ripe for visual experimentation and play!