Why You Hate Google’s New Logo

At the Forty-second Street F station, in Manhattan, in a mosaic of a stone wall dripping with overgrown vines and flowers, there’s an eerily provocative Jung quotation: “Nature must not win the game, but she cannot lose.” That’s how I feel about history and modernity as represented by serif and sans-serif typefaces: elegant, organic curves and feet versus spareness and “clean lines.” Whenever a brand wants to freshen itself up, you start hearing talk about “clean lines,” as if a few gorgeous, old-fashioned letters were keeping us in the Dark Ages. Google’s new logo, announced and unveiled this week, is the latest victim. Its old logo’s typeface—reminiscent of literature, newspapers, printing—had a reassuring hint of history, paying its respects to what it had come to improve upon and replace. The letters’ literary old serifs were subtly authoritative: the sturdy, handsome “G,” the stately, appealing little “oo,” the typewriterish, lovable “g,” the elegant “l,” the thoughtful “e.”