-> . Logo Competition Voting!! <-

[Phil]

And now the moment you've all been waiting for!! Below are the finalists for the . Logo Competition along with a short paragraph explaining their designs. We received many great entries and the moderators had the difficult task of narrowing them down to just a few entries.

There will be two rounds of voting if one particular logo does not reach at least 50% of the votes. In the event that this happens, we'll have a second round of voting with the top 2 finalists.

Official voting will not open up until Monday morning. Take this weekend to look over the designs and decide which is best for our association. First round voting will go until Friday (23.1) at 12:00 (EEST). If needed, second round voting will begin the following Monday and last till the following Friday at noon.

Please note that the winning entry may not be the finalized logo. The designer will then work with us streamline & tweakthe final design.

Many thanks to everyone who has participated in the competition!! The entire . association truly appreciates it.

Drum-roll please.........

[Phil]

Entry #0

The logo depicts . in several ways:

The map of Finland, together with the embedded 'I' that forms part of the abberiviated title implies that this is who we are, and this is where we are.

The 'timeless' shaking of hands offers friendship across cultures and boundaries. It has been sucessfully used in many logos including Nokia.

The inversely coloured 'I' places emphasis on International, in that not all members speak English as their mother language

The blue colour used in the design is a neutral colour, which implies the very nature of our organisation.

The small text above and below the abberviation immediately informs the viewer exactly what the characters stand for

All in all this logo quite 'busy' and uses many concepts to descibe our organisation and clearly depicts exactly what . stands for. Not only that, but people can easily identify with it. Please give it your well deserved vote to help keep it where it rightfully belongs. Thank you.

Entry #1

A variation of the existing logo. Modern, stylish, minimalistic, functional. A timeless design.

[Phil]

Entry #2

"The Key to the Information"

Based around 4 main fundamental elements.

1. KEY shape - unlocking in the information that is vital for us to settle in more comfortably and feel at home here in Finland.

2. INFORMATION - the international sign for information is the italic ‘i’ encased in a blue circle.

3. BLUE / WHITE - the colours of the Finnish flag and all things related to Finland!

4. esaf - this is purposely eating into the blue circle. This represents how whilst we are all outsiders/foreigners, we are connected together by this forum and our sharing of information.

[Phil]

Entry #3



These are two variations of the same design.

This is still at initial development stage but gives you an example of a brand concept that I think has many miles and a strong personality. It uses type and a speech bubbled shape for the main logo, to highlight language / cultural difficulties for English speaking individuals in Finland. This is supported by ‘International English Speaking Association Finland’ which doubles up as a strap-line. ‘English Speaking On Finland’ Its describes a (with English being the chosen language) straight talking on the subject of Finland. Alternatively the strap-line could say ‘English Speaking Finland’ which is equally as strong. All this is starting to build stronger brand personality and presence. It talks more directly to someone that’s never heard of . before. I think there needs to be another colour introduced and a real focus on Pantone colours used.

[Phil]

Congratulations to entries #0 & #2 - They will be moving on to the final round of voting starting next Monday morning.