Style combination · Pairs well

Japanese Postwar Modernism × Munich 1972 Olympic Design

Munich built its pictograms partly on Tokyo 1964's; add Kamekura's single emblem on a wide empty field to a Munich layout when one poster must carry more gravity than a series.

From the research on Munich 1972 Olympic Design (Otl Aicher)

Mix them and make something Japanese Postwar Modernism Munich 1972 Olympic Design

A sample layout drawn from the recipe: shapes from Japanese Postwar Modernism, their arrangement from Japanese Postwar Modernism, the finish from Munich 1972 Olympic Design. Not a real work, and not an image of either style.

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.

Japanese Postwar Modernism Munich 1972 Olympic Design (Otl Aicher)

Type from Munich 1972 Olympic Design: Grotesque & neo-grotesque
Flush left, ragged right
Colour from Japanese Postwar Modernism: Limited spot colours
Flat fields
Form from Japanese Postwar Modernism: Geometric primitives
Stylised figuration
Composition from Japanese Postwar Modernism: Generous white space
Single focal point
Surface from Munich 1972 Olympic Design: Flat

The type

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

Display · Munich 1972 Olympic Design

Form

Inter Tight, standing in for Univers (Adrian Frutiger, 1957), the only typeface of the Games' official communications, with Univers 55 as the house weight

Text · Japanese Postwar Modernism

Building on the New Typography that Hiromu Hara and the Nippon Kobo circle had absorbed in the 1930s, Japan's postwar graphic designers fused the grid, sans-serif and objective photography of European modernism with indigenous traditions of family crests (kamon), asymmetry and charged emptiness (ma). From the Graphic '55 exhibition and the Nippon Design Center to Yusaku Kamekura's Tokyo 1964 Olympic posters, it produced bold emblematic symbols, luminous flat colour fields and photography of startling precision.

Zen Kaku Gothic New; Japanese Postwar Modernism used Gothic and Mincho

The colours

The ground and leading colours come from Japanese Postwar Modernism, with a counter-accent from Munich 1972 Olympic Design. The ink reads on the ground at 4.5:1 or more.

Japanese Postwar Modernism Munich 1972 Olympic Design (Otl Aicher)

#f4f1ea ground · 36%
#111111 ink · 14%
#d7261e accent · 18%
#f29a2e accent · 14%
#c8a24a accent · 10%
#49aa76 accent · 8%

As CSS

:root {
  --ground: #f4f1ea;
  --ink: #111111;
  --accent-1: #d7261e;
  --accent-2: #f29a2e;
  --accent-3: #c8a24a;
  --accent-4: #49aa76;
  --font-display: "Inter Tight", sans-serif;
  --font-text: "Zen Kaku Gothic New", sans-serif;
}

Use it with care

Munich 1972 Olympic Design (Otl Aicher): The Olympic rings are a protected IOC mark and the Munich posters, emblem and pictograms are the work of named designers: borrow the method (one grid, a light landscape palette, grid-drawn figures), not the artefacts. The 'cheerful Games' are also bound up with the Munich massacre of 5–6 September 1972, when Black September gunmen killed 11 members of the Israeli team; use the identity's optimism knowingly.