Drop It Like It’s Hawt
The New Brand Identity For Dropbox
The first rule of design critique is to know the difference between “I like it/don’t like it” and “It’s good/not good”. To critique well we must first understand the intentions and goals the thing is trying to achieve. What is it trying to say? How does it go about doing that? Is it successful?
Because without those questions, we are only left with whether or not we like the way it looks, which degrades graphic design to not much more than decoration. Of course, craftsmanship is important as well and we can dive into those details too, but what good does it do us to appreciate fine linework or good kerning if a design is completely empty in concept or cannot accomplish its goals?
“We want to inspire creative energy, instead of taking it away.” — Dropbox
The Dropbox logo isn’t so much new as it is massaged, so I don’t feel its particularly worth spending time on. It’s better. But, the identity and all the work around the logo is insanely different. At first glance it’s shocking, due to the weird warm and cool color combinations and a typeface thats just odd. Nothing here seems to fit a mold of what we expect and I feel that is the whole point.
“Our new design system is built on the idea that extraordinary things happen when diverse minds come together. We communicate this visually by pairing contrasting colors, type, and imagery to show what’s possible when we bring ideas together in unexpected ways.” — Dropbox
I’m not much for using the term “storytelling” in graphic design, but it does seem to fit here. Dropbox has created an identity built by lots of people where images are combined with one another, colors are thrown together and it feels like nothing is quite as complete as it needs to be. It’s unexpected and a little rough because what they’re trying to communicate is collaboration and imagination. We’re not seeing a final product as much as we are the process in action.
The whole look of it suggests that is what this product/company wants to be — they’re championing the creative process and want to be a part of yours. This isn’t your final destination or beginning, it really lies somewhere in the middle. The colors especially feel like we’re looking into some sort of dream world far from reality. Somewhere in the mind of an artist? The identity makes us put all these images and colors together and ask “what the fuck is going on here?”.
In some ways it’s trendy because it pulls influence from other identities where neon colors are heavily used and the whole approach is not that different than Adobe. Yet, it’s strong enough to be recognizable as its own thing.
I agree with Jarrod’s assessment; If this were a marketing campaign this is a different conversation. But this identity needs to apply to its product in some way and that will be the most interesting thing to see. Its definitely something the design team has considered, they wouldn’t have simplified the logo as they did if they were not thinking about how this will work in primary applications. My final judgement on the identity will depend on how it works when I’m using the product.
I’ve always felt in order to give design a fair critique, you have to give it some time to prove itself. 6–12 months is not unreasonable in my opinion. Reactionary drive-bys do design, or this industry as a whole, no good at all. I think giving this identity a good amount of time will be especially important because it is so shockingly unexpected for a product like this, it’s come out swinging and knocked everyone off their center a bit. I need to gather myself and see what Dropbox can do with it. As it stands right now, I love the identity for its boldness and swashbuckling attitude. Comparisons will be made to modern design trends but I see as much DADA influence as anything and I hope I still like it this much in the future. If it fails the product, or makes it worse though, then it has no chance.
Good art is well designed; good design is artfully done.
