50@50: The evolution of FIU’s logo

To celebrate the university’s 50th anniversary, FIU News is sharing 50 moments in FIU’s history as part of our “50@50″ series. The images in the video below appear courtesy of FIU Athletics and the Special Collections & University Archives.

By Joel Delgado ’12 MS ’17 

Since the early days of the university, when the south campus consisted of a handful of buildings at an abandoned airport and the Sunblazer was the official mascot, a lot has changed — including a series of new looks and branding changes that overhauled FIU’s appearance.

Up until recently, as the university continued to grow and expand at an exponential rate, the FIU brand became somewhat incongruent with a plethora of logos, icons and sub-brands.

That all changed in 2008. Oscar Negret, senior graphic designer and art director in the Office of External Relations, was charged with leading the redesign of FIU’s university logo and athletic mark – one that would help give the FIU brand a unified voice.

“We wanted to show that we are proud of what we have become as a university and that was the idea that drove the redesign,” Negret said. “A good brand needs to reflect what the institution really is about. It has to say something.”

With a team of designers in the Office of Publications, Negret created the new lettering, which features F-I-U in a dark blue Princetown font with a new, more vibrant gold serving as the lettering’s border.

Then, Negret helped create a new athletic mark for the university’s sports programs. With help from the firm that designed the previous logo used by FIU Athletics from 2002 to 2008, Negret dropped the plants and shield from the logo, inserted the new F-I-U lettering and designed a fiercer, more aggressive Roary with fangs showing and outstretched claws.

The result was a logo that reflected “FIU’s confidence in the future,” said then-President Modesto A. Maidique.

Along with the new logo came a comprehensive branding system that included personalized logos for each academic and non-academic department. In the years since the unveiling, the logo and lettering have given the university a bold, unified identity.

The new logo has even received praise from marketing experts. On HubSpot’s marketing blog, it was recently named one of the best college logos in the country.

“We are a vibrant, modern, forward-thinking institution and this new, contemporary look reflects those qualities,” Negret says.

Look of the 90s

More than a decade earlier, the university went through a similar exercise when the logo below was introduced. In a newsletter sent in 1990, FIU and President Emeritus Modesto A. Maidique announced a new university logo, replacing the oval logo that had been in use since the university opened its doors in 1972.

The early 90s logo was then replaced by the seal and FIU in thin lettering, which was used until the current logo.