Ah, the r/graphic_design subreddit – a community haven for like-minded designers to share tips, career advice and now, apparently, the most abysmal logo designs you’ve ever seen. It all started when a user pointed out how “plain awful” the old subreddit logo was, prompting a response from the original creator: “You want to make a cooler one, feel free”. Since then, chaos has ensued.
You’d like to think that a subreddit full of graphic designers could design a logo with ease, and yet the onslaught of hilariously dreadful designs proves otherwise. While some pure souls offered genuinely thoughtful new logo designs, most users made a mockery of the whole ordeal, offering laughably bad designs – and let’s be honest, that’s what most of us want to see, so here are my favourites.
All the usual design crime suspects were present and correct, including Papyrus and Comic Sans font, frustratingly uneven spacing, illegible maximalism and hand-drawn Microsoft Paint abominations. Other users ripped off iconic logos and some submitted painfully juvenile designs, slapping on a “made with Canva” watermark for good measure. Some rejected creating a new design altogether, suggesting that the viral “graphic design is my passion” meme should be the honourary subreddit logo.
The “graphic design is my passion” meme (Image credit: Yungterra via Tumblr)
“Just get AI to do it” chimed in one user, sharing an overtly AI-generated logo design of a hand holding a pen with text reading “GAPHHC DESIGN”. Some took the running gag as an opportunity to criticise the current career climate, with one user submitting a design that boldly read “Why can’t I find a job?”. Naturally, in the wake of the interenet’s collective Brat girl summer, numerous low-res green backgrounded logos popped up, inspired by Charli XCX’s Brat marketing.
As of now, the old logo is still present (probably for the best), but there are plenty of legitimate designs that could make a good replacement – so long as the subreddit can settle on a serious design. To see the full host of laughable logos, head to r/graphic_design.
