Before it was called Nike, the company founded by Phil Knight and Bill Bowerman in 1964 went by Blue Ribbon Sports. In 1971, as it adopted the name Nike — the Greek goddess of victory — it needed a mark.
Knight, then an accounting lecturer, handed the job to one of his Portland State University students, Carolyn Davidson. She offered a fluid shape evoking motion and the goddess’s wing. Billed at $35, it was approved by a less-than-thrilled Knight: “I don’t love it, but it’ll grow on me.”
Shape before colour
The swoosh works precisely because it needs neither text nor colour: the silhouette is enough. That is exactly the bet behind Logodle — recognise a brand by shape alone, with colour arriving only as a reward.
Decades later, Nike gave Carolyn Davidson company stock as thanks. The logo itself has barely changed.