The importance of a symbol dates back to the beginning of time as human begin to communicate. A symbol is a sign or mark that should represent an activity, idea or object. Symbols can be pictorial or abstract and can be utilized within a cultural, societal , political or commercial context. The most effective symbols work across national boundaries.
The FIFA World Cup of 1970 was held in Mexico City, Mexico. As I am inspired and interested in soccer, as well as hispanic culture, I chose to focus on Lance Wyman's PICO World Cup Mascot symbol system. To create a unique symbol of my own that was unrecognizable as new to the system but fit right in was a difficult task.
Firstly, the country I wanted to add had to be selected, I chose France because of the likelihood it could have been included originally. After I chose the country I researched French fashion from before 1970. I came to understand that the 1950's and 1960's were a huge times for fashion. After much research I felt as though the famous black and white horizontally striped shirt and the beret were best representative of France.
After creating the first draft in Illustrator and getting insightful feedback I decided to change a few specific things. Firstly, there were too many stripes and too close together. I decided to spread them out and not use as many. Secondly, the beret looked realistic it just didn’t fit into the system yet.
Going forward there were still little things that needed to be cleaned up and perfected. I had to make sure the shapes were clean and crisp. I had to make sure the sizing was correct, even though I had started off copying the existing symbols but didn’t mean I hadn’t made little changes along the way wouldn't take away from forms that needed to stay similar to the symbols to fit within the system.
After much exploration one can come to understand that the final symbol form works exceptionally better than the original concept. The first beret I created just didn't pull enough hat inspiration from the original system. Within the original system the hats were all symmetrical with the exception of Morocco, Peru, and West Germany. The idea was that I pull the hat size and shape from Czechoslovakia and the piece coming off the top from Peru. The pants I pulled inspiration from Brazil and the shirt I took the width of the stripes from Morocco's garment. That allowed the final symbol form to fit clearly into the symbol system.
