Xiaomi’s new ‘squircle’ logo? Subtle rebrands are nothing new – from Celine to Burberry, 6 luxury brands that made big statements with tiny design tweaks
- Not an April Fool’s joke: Chinese smartphone giant Xiaomi announced a new logo at its Mi Mix Fold presentation as part of a long-awaited brand identity overhaul
- Following Burberry, Berluti and Balenciaga, 2018 saw Balmain switch up to a bolder, more impactful logo – that some netizens said reminded them of bitcoin’s
It might seem like an April Fool’s joke but it’s legit: Chinese electronics company Xiaomi announced at the presentation of the Mi Mix Fold that it has changed its logo as part of its brand identity overhaul.
Xiaomi’s logo is now a curved-edge “squircle” rather than a square, although the company’s CEO Lei Jun says that it wasn’t simply a matter of “[changing] the shape from square to round”. Nope, instead it took the brand some considerable time to pick the right shape, even using mathematical equations, the culmination of a long process begun when the company started its rebranding in 2017.
They are not alone – the luxury world has also seen its share of logo changes over the years, ranging from subtle to, well, not so subtle. Here are some of the most memorable logo rebrands of our times.
Celine
In September 2018, Celine announced that it had launched a new logo.
The brand even deleted its Instagram history for this fresh start, heralding the arrival of Hedi Slimane and bidding goodbye to Phoebe Philo’s creative direction. The logo change was a subtle one: to the naked eye, it seems like the brand simply took the accent off the e, thinned out the letters and pushed them closer together (what we in the industry call kerning).
