Alcoa (1963)

The American aluminum giant Alcoa is celebrating its 125th anniversary this year. In addition, it is the 50th anniversary of its corporate mark, introduced in 1963 when the company celebrated its 75th anniversary (are you with me?). The Alcoa mark is also notable as being one of Bass' early big clients after seriously moving into corporate identity design. Not only was "the Aluminum Company of America" a big company that sold just about anything that could be made from aluminum, it was also a very public brand that advertised nationally.

New trademarks introduced at this time were often simple and abstract, replacing cluttered old shields and seals. Not so this time, as Alcoa had already gone through this process in the mid-50s. At the time a firm known as Harley Earl Associates had designed a striking new mark consisting of two triangles. Unfortunately, the application wasn't as pure. The two triangles were typically enclosed by a rectangle with rounded corners with the brand mark, some additional text and, oh, a miniature version of the old shield symbol. In addition, it was potentially not unique enough to be trademarked.

New logo: News Corp

As reported earlier, media giant News Corp is splitting up, with its lucrative entertainment division split off to a separate company, separating it from the troubled publishing division. The corporate identity for the entertainment division, named 21st Century Fox, was unveiled earlier this month, and yesterday News Corp presented its new logo.

This is technically a new company, as the new News Corp is spun off from the old News Corp, which will change its name to 21st Century Fox. The new script logo intends to be friendlier, and it initially seems like this is yet another humbling day in the life of Rupert Murdoch, until you find out that the script is actully based on his handwriting.

New logo: Avianca

Avianca and TACA, two major airline groups in Latin America, merged back in 2009, creating a holding company that includes the former flag carriers of Colombia, El Salvador, Guatemala and Costa Rica. Since then, they've spend a few years integrating the two groups while the old brand names were retained. That ended yesterday, May 28, when Avianca became the group's primary brand.

Both airlines have previously used bird symbols (a condor in the case of Avianca) and the new symbol pays some tribute to that. It can also be seen as a map of the Americas.

It has previously been reported that Lippincott aided the airline in selecting the name. Local media are crediting Lippincott and Sancho BBDO for the design work.

New logo: Méditel

Méditel is a mobile telecommunications company in Morocco, one of three licensed telecom operators in the kingdom. Last week, on May 21, the company launched a new brand strategy with a new logo that it says is more "modern, direct and powerful". It uses a rectangular shape an custom lettering.

New logo: Policja

Policja has been the been the name used by the Polish police force since the fall of communism. Last Friday, it unveiled a new visual identity. It was created by Mamastudio, who took part in a competition.

The new logo features a stylised version of the eight-pronged star that serves as Policja's emblem. It scales better and can be used in more varied settings than than its predecessor.

New logo: Ville de Lille

Lille is a city in French Flanders in the northernmost part of France, bordering Belgium. The actual city has a population of 228,000 inhabitants, making it the tenth-largest city in France, but it is the centre of the fourth-largest metropolitan area in France with about a million inhabitants. Last week, the city unveiled a new logo, created by Graphèmes, which is based in Lille.

The old logo was reportedly designed in the mid-80s. The new logo was developed with plenty of community input, and employs a playful red iteration of the city name while making the fleur-de-lis symbol much smaller.

New logo: ShopHQ

ShopNBC is one of the larger home shopping networks in the United States. Despite the name, it is not owned by NBCUniversal, rather it is a part of company known as Valuevision Media that licenses the NBC name and its peacock. This week, May 22, it announced its intention to rebrand the network as ShopHQ. The new brand was developed with Landor Associates.