I hear you're a Tuscan now, Father!

When neo-classical architect Quinlan Terry, gave an introductory talk to the classical orders. He said something that caught my eye.

"One of the things I learnt from Raymond Erith is, every person is one of the three orders. He would often come back from a client and say 'she was Doric. So was he. We must definitely give them a Doric house.'

The last house I showed you the client was definitely Ionic.

When I was doing Downing Street, and all the rooms Mrs Thatcher had, Mrs Thatcher is definitely Corinthian."

Now the idea that we all have our own tastes and preferences is not new. The idea that we all have our own preferred classical order makes me laugh.

But since watching that clip I've noticed something more broadly. The dominant 'design style' of the past 10-15 years has been shifting towards Doric and Tuscan.

Above you can see the Mozilla logo meme that I copied off someone on twitter.

But there are a few more examples of what appears to be a similar trend (HT to ad strategist James Boodt.)

Why are all the premium fashion brands ditching their Serif fonts for sans-serif fonts. Now they look more alike than they did before. This one puzzles me. Do they all think, if we don't copy everyone else we'll look old hat?

Likewise, there's a trend for football teams to move from the quite intricately designed crests to circular printable badges.

This one I find a bit easier to understand. The brief is to design an asset that looks good on shirts and works well on social media display pictures. Whereas a lot of the old crests were often designed to be engraved on the club gates or to look good on letter heads.

Still, it's interesting to see how the herd always sticks together, even when the aim is to be distinct.

When the world zigs, zig again.

But what is going on here?

Is it to do with the tools graphic designers use? Do computer aided design systems bias against details.

Is culture becoming more afraid to stand out? Is it a collapse in quality design - like when Create Streets bemoan the London Mayor's new water fountains.

Or is this just the the natural tides of fashion? In a few decades should we expect the tide to move back towards corinthian and composite styles? Will fonts be serif again? Will football crests become 3D?

I don't know. Do you?

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Edit: I was made aware recently of the concept of "Hotelling's Law" named after the tendency of similar shops or businesses to be grouped into one street, neighbourhood or district.

From the Wiki: Hotelling's law is an observation in economics that in many markets it is rational for producers to make their products as similar as possible. This is also referred to as the principle of minimum differentiation as well as Hotelling's linear city model. The observation was made by Harold Hotelling (1895–1973). Not after the tendency for hotels to accumulate near one another, as I had first imagined.

This could be what's at play when it comes to the logo design of the fashion brands and to some extent the football clubs. Where it makes sense to make your logo look like the logo of other premium brands so that you're remain in good company, rather than being 'left behind'.

It sheds light on how following the herd can be beneficial, and why making a conscious attempt to differentiate or stand out always feels like a bold and risky move.