Stylogeny combining Googie × Memphis Design

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Style combination · Pairs well

Googie × Memphis Design

Memphis revived its boomerangs and squiggles; mix the two for a playful atomic-meets-postmodern pattern system.

From the research on Googie & Atomic Age

Mix them and make something Googie Memphis Design

PopGoogie × Memphis Design1945 · 1981
A sample layout drawn from the recipe: shapes from Memphis Design, their arrangement from Googie, the finish from Googie. Not a real work, and not an image of either style.

01

What each style brings

Each part of the design comes from the style with the stronger say in it, and each style gives at least two.

Googie & Atomic Age Memphis Design

Type from Googie
Colour from Memphis Design
Form from Memphis Design
Composition from Googie
Surface from Googie

02

The type

Open fonts standing in for each style’s own type, which is often hand-drawn or commercial.

Display · Googie

Pop

Yellowtail, standing in for Brush Script (Robert E. Smith, 1942)

Text · Memphis Design

The Milan collective founded by Ettore Sottsass, whose furniture, laminates and objects (first shown in September 1981) became a graphic language of their own. Clashing colours, speckles, squiggles, zigzags and primitive geometric shapes were combined with deliberate bad taste, mocking modernist good form while quoting 1950s kitsch, Pop and Art Deco.

Jost; Memphis Design used Futura and ITC Avant Garde Gothic

03

The colours

The ground and leading colours come from Memphis Design, with a counter-accent from Googie. The ink reads on the ground at 4.5:1 or more.

Googie & Atomic Age Memphis Design

  • #ffd23f ground · 36%
  • #111111 ink · 14%
  • #ff5a36 accent · 18%
  • #2ec4b6 accent · 14%
  • #2a52be accent · 10%
  • #f7a1c4 accent · 8%

As CSS

:root {
  --ground: #ffd23f;
  --ink: #111111;
  --accent-1: #ff5a36;
  --accent-2: #2ec4b6;
  --accent-3: #2a52be;
  --accent-4: #f7a1c4;
  --font-display: "Yellowtail", cursive;
  --font-text: "Jost", sans-serif;
}

04

The two styles

A glowing retro space-themed sign reads “Orbit Bites” in large turquoise and orange cursive on a dark navy background. A rocket, ringed planet, starbursts, sweeping yellow trails and angular pink panels surround the lettering. 1945–1965 · North America Googie & Atomic Age The exuberant commercial modernism of post-war American roadside culture (coffee shops, motels, car washes, bowling alleys and neon signs), named in 1952 by critic Douglas Haskell after John Lautner's Googie's coffee shop in Los Angeles (1949). Upswept roofs, boomerangs, starbursts, atoms and parabolic arches worked as giant signs for passing drivers, with casual scripts and neon promising a Space Age future. A dense geometric pattern on a pink background combines turquoise polka-dot triangles, yellow squares with black dashes, blue circles with yellow sprinkles, orange-red zigzags, and scattered squiggles and small shapes. Bold black offset shapes give many motifs a shadowed, layered appearance. 1981–1988 · Southern Europe Memphis Design The Milan collective founded by Ettore Sottsass, whose furniture, laminates and objects (first shown in September 1981) became a graphic language of their own. Clashing colours, speckles, squiggles, zigzags and primitive geometric shapes were combined with deliberate bad taste, mocking modernist good form while quoting 1950s kitsch, Pop and Art Deco.

05

More combinations

With Googie

All 17 combinations with Googie

With Memphis Design

All 17 combinations with Memphis Design

Every style combination