Brand design must transcend trends, but also take advantage of them.
The accelerated pace at which we live means that many trends are born and die at the same pace. What works today is likely to be obsolete in a few months. It is no longer like before, when a certain trend or movement prevailed in a more obvious way, now many different design trends coexist at the same time. That is why it is so dangerous to entrust the design of a brand to a merely aesthetic fashion.
A maxim of branding is that it should be functional, but it is also true that brands cannot (and should not) completely abstract themselves from what is happening around them, trends included. We must not forget that visual codes appeal to the social imaginary and are linked to a popular understanding. In this sense, the concepts of “modern”, “classic” or “technological” are not static but vary with the historical moment.
Good design handles this with great skill, always finding the balance between trend and universal codes, those that steer clear of the volatility of taste. A good brand design will find current graphic solutions and at the same time contain that intrinsic ‘truth’ to the brand that makes it solid and different from the base.
Branding must be approached from a long-term perspective and, although it is fine to play with the trends of the moment, we must know how to choose them. We must transcend the trend or the designer’s own style and think about what the project, the sector or the specific client demands. Before being guided by a particular trend, we must consider whether it is relevant to our category, our current positioning or the consumer group we are targeting.