Louis Vuitton Logo Meaning, Symbolism, Design, and History
Louis Vuitton Malletier, commonly known simply as Louis Vuitton, is a French high-end luxury fashion brand and company established in 1854 by Louis Vuitton.
The brand designs, produces, and sells a wide array of fashion accessories. Some of its popular offerings include ready-to-wear apparel, shoes, luxury bags, watches, jewelry, leather goods, sunglasses, and books.
Louis Vuitton is not only one of the oldest fashion houses on the planet. It’s also one of the most financially successful fashion companies, consistently grossing billions in annual revenue. The company posted a gross revenue of 14 billion euros in 2020. And for six years in a row (2006 – 2011), the fashion house was named the most valuable luxury brand in the world.
Louis Vuitton credits its runaway success mainly to its clever marketing campaigns. The company adopts a sales strategy where it avails its products both in brick-and-mortar stores as well as online.
Louis Vuitton’s products can be accessed physically at standalone boutiques and lease departments located in high-end retail outlets or online through the e-commerce section of the company’s official website.
And like most successful luxury fashion companies, Louis Vuitton sells its products worldwide. The company is based in Paris, France. However, it operates in at least 460 stores in over 50 countries.
Louis Vuitton is also one of the many successful fashion brands that maintain a fairly simplistic logo. This post takes an in-depth look into the Louis Vuitton logo by analyzing its appearance, symbolism, and any design changes to the design since its creation.
Louis Vuitton Logo Appearance
Logo Shape
Louis Vuitton deals in a variety of fashion products. However, the company maintains one logo across all its products and official branding materials. The main design element of Louis Vuitton’s logo is the LV monogram. The monogram is italicized, CAPITALIZED, and sports a serif typeface.
If you examine the monogram closely, you’ll realize that the letter “L” is set slightly to the left bottom of the letter “V.” Underneath the monogram is the wordmark “Louis Vuitton,” set in a black, bold serif. However, this wordmark doesn’t appear in all versions of the logo.
Logo Colors
Louis Vuitton uses a black-and-white color scheme. Black and white has remained the brand’s official color palette for years.
But like most companies, the Louis Vuitton logo doesn’t always appear in a monochrome. The logo has colored versions too, including a white monogram against a black background and a golden monogram against a white background.
Logo Font
The font used for the “Louis Vuitton” word mark and text is known as Futura. Futura is a geometric sans-serif typeface designed by Paul Renner and initially released to the public fonts market in 1927.
Futura was developed as a contribution to the New Frankfurt-project. The typeface takes inspirations from geometric fonts similar to the Bauhaus design styles that were popular around the same period.
Although Futura was Renner’s brainchild, the font was officially developed into a typeface by Bauer Type Foundry. Bauer Type Foundry envisioned a font that would compete Ludwig & Mayer’s seminal Erbar typeface released in 1926.
Besides Paul Renner, several other designers have contributed to the development of Futura’s weights and styles. Notable ones include Edwin W. Shaar and Tommy Thompson.
Louis Vuitton Logo Symbolism
The Monogram
The obvious meaning of the LV monogram is that the two letters are the initials of Louis Vuitton.
Like most successful brands, Louis Vuitton came up with a logo that pays tribute to the company’s founder. The moment you see or visualize the logo, attention is immediately drawn to the company’s name and by extension, its founder.
Louis Vuitton’s LV monogram appears bold, italicized, and is set in ALL-CAPS. Being such a simplistic logo, it was necessary for the designers to implement extra visual elements to make the design stand out from similar monograms. That’s likely why they chose a bold, italicized, and CAPITALIZED version of the monogram.
The logo’s visual effects are further enhanced by the unique font used and the fact that the two letters are not exactly positioned on the same line.
Symbolism of the Colors
Black is the color of power and elegance. Louis Vuitton likely settled on this color to portray its fashion products as stylish and durable. White connotes simplicity and purity.
When used together, black and white resonate with classic simplicity and timeless elegance. The two colors also look strong and elegant on any surface or background.
Louis Vuitton Logo Creation and History
After establishing Louis Vuitton in 1854, Mr. Malletier was not in a hurry to develop a logo for his brand. His immediate focus was business expansion. So, the company operated without an official logo for several years.
It was not until 1896 that Louis Vuitton got its first logo. The logo was designed by Malletier’s son, Georges Vuitton, after taking over the reins of the company following his father’s death. It’s the same logo the company uses to date.
But why did Georges Vuitton settle on the “LV” monogram?
Georges Vuitton would have experimented with a plethora of graphic designs. After all, he was assuming the leadership of one of the fastest-growing luxury fashion brands in the world.
However, Georges settled on a simple logo that was based on the initials of his father’s name. This was his way of paying tribute to a man who had established what would become one of the world’s most successful family businesses.
Some people also theorize that Georges Vuitton came up with a simple logo as he was a bit pressed for time. At the point Georges took over Louis Vuitton, there were widespread reports of counterfeits. Many unscrupulous traders would simply design cheap trunks and suitcases, then deceptively market them as premier Louis Vuitton creations.
To curb these underhand dealings, it was necessary for the company to come up with a logo fast. And the simplest yet most unique graphic image was the one using Louis Vuitton’s initials.
Right after designing the monogram, Louis Vuitton moved with speed to put the design on its bags and trunks. But while this decision prevented random brands from passing their cheap fashion accessories as premier Louis Vuitton creations, the company’s monogram has been a subject of counterfeiting for years.
At some point, the “LV” design was one of the most counterfeited logos in the world. Fortunately, advancements in technology have made it remarkably easy to differentiate between original and counterfeited Louis Vuitton logos.
Louis Vuitton’s logo is relatively simplistic for a company that deals in luxury fashion accessories. However, the brand’s monogram is creatively executed, making it unique yet memorable.