TOP SYMBOLS & TRADEMARKS OF THE WORLD 1 – 11
Complete Set 1973 – 1983
Franco Maria Ricci & Corinna Ferrari [Editors]
Offered here is a complete set of eleven uniform 4.25 x 8.5-inch English language guidebooks [all published] that indexed 7,968 symbols and trademarks collected internationally during the decade between 1973 and 1983 from Argentina, Austria, Belgium, Brazil, Bulgaria, Canada, Cuba, Czechoslovakia, Denmark, Finland, France, Great Britain, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Jugoslavia, the Netherlands, Norway, Peru, Poland, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, United States, the U. S. S. R., Venezuela, and West Germany. All volumes uniformly designed by Franco Maria Ricci and printed in Italy.
These books are uncommon in commerce and scarce in sets, and truly rare with all eleven volumes complete and in uniformly fine condition, especially due to their user friendly nature that inevitably invited use and abuse.
The first seven volumes were released in 1973 and featured 5,022 black and white symbols and trademarks created after 1945. Each volume represented a geographic area with each item arranged alphabetically by client name along with the city, activity, designer and year. All marks were also carefully indexed and cross referenced by Designer, Studio and Industry Sector. This made for a remarkably accessible guidebook that expoloited both form and content for maximum effect.
- Franco Maria Ricci & Corinna Ferrari [Editors]: TOP SYMBOLS & TRADEMARKS OF THE WORLD 1 [United States part one]. Milan: Deco Press s. r. l., 1973. First edition. Duodecimo. Black fabricoid with white silk screen decoration. Black endpapers. [Unpaginated] 696 marks reproduced in black and white accompanied by full producton credits. Introductions by George Nelson (USA) and Burton Kramer (Canada). A fine copy.
- Franco Maria Ricci & Corinna Ferrari [Editors]: TOP SYMBOLS & TRADEMARKS OF THE WORLD 2 [United States part two; Canada]. Milan: Deco Press s. r. l., 1973. First edition. Duodecimo. Black fabricoid with white silk screen decoration. Black endpapers. [Unpaginated] 598 marks reproduced in black and white accompanied by full producton credits. Index. A fine copy.
- Franco Maria Ricci & Corinna Ferrari [Editors]: TOP SYMBOLS & TRADEMARKS OF THE WORLD 3 [Japan; Spain; Latin America ( inc. Brazil, Venezuela, Argentina, Peru, Cuba) ]. Milan: Deco Press s. r. l., 1973. First edition. Duodecimo. Black fabricoid with white silk screen decoration. Black endpapers. [Unpaginated] 616 marks reproduced in black and white accompanied by full producton credits. Introductions by Juan Perucho (Spain) and Décio Pignatari (Latin America). Index. A fine copy.
- Franco Maria Ricci & Corinna Ferrari [Editors]: TOP SYMBOLS & TRADEMARKS OF THE WORLD 4 [Great Britain; Ireland; Benelux (Belgium, the Netherlands)]. Milan: Deco Press s. r. l., 1973. First edition. Duodecimo. Black fabricoid with white silk screen decoration. Black endpapers. [Unpaginated] 768 marks reproduced in black and white accompanied by full producton credits. Introductions by Colin Forbes (Great Britain and Ireland) and Pieter Brattinga (Benelux). Index. A fine copy.
- Franco Maria Ricci & Corinna Ferrari [Editors]: TOP SYMBOLS & TRADEMARKS OF THE WORLD 5 [France; Italy]. Milan: Deco Press s. r. l., 1973. First edition. Duodecimo. Black fabricoid with white silk screen decoration. Black endpapers. [Unpaginated] 893 marks reproduced in black and white accompanied by full producton credits. Introductions by François Barré (France) and Vittorio Gregotti (Italy). Index. Lower binding edge rubbed, otherwise a fine copy.
- Franco Maria Ricci & Corinna Ferrari [Editors]: TOP SYMBOLS & TRADEMARKS OF THE WORLD 6 [Switzerland; West Germany; Austria]. Milan: Deco Press s. r. l., 1973. First edition. Duodecimo. Black fabricoid with white silk screen decoration. Black endpapers. [Unpaginated] 773 marks reproduced in black and white accompanied by full producton credits. Introductions by Hans Neuburg (Switzerland) and Jupp Ernst (West Germany and Austria). Index. A fine copy.
- Franco Maria Ricci & Corinna Ferrari [Editors]: TOP SYMBOLS & TRADEMARKS OF THE WORLD 7 [Scandinavia (Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Finland, Iceland); Socialist Countries (Jugoslavia, Czechoslovakia, Poland, Hungary, Bulgaria and the U. S. S. R.)]. Milan: Deco Press s. r. l., 1973. First edition. Duodecimo. Black fabricoid with white silk screen decoration. Black endpapers. [Unpaginated] 678 marks reproduced in black and white accompanied by full producton credits. Introductions by Martin Gavler (Scandinavia), Stane Bernik (Yugoslavia) and Grega Kosak (Socialist Countries). Index. A fine copy.
- Franco Maria Ricci & Corinna Ferrari [Editors]: TOP SYMBOLS & TRADEMARKS OF THE WORLD 8 [1977 Annual]. Milan: Deco Press s. r. l., 1977. First edition. Duodecimo. Black fabricoid with white silk screen decoration. Black endpapers. [Unpaginated] 745 marks reproduced in black and white accompanied by full producton credits. Introduction by Tomás Maldonado. Indexes. A fine copy.
- Franco Maria Ricci & Corinna Ferrari [Editors]: TOP SYMBOLS & TRADEMARKS OF THE WORLD 9 [1978 Annual]. Milan: F. M. Ricci / Deco Press, 1978. First edition. Duodecimo. Black fabricoid with white silk screen decoration. Black endpapers. [Unpaginated] 714 marks reproduced in black and white accompanied by full producton credits. Introduction by Gillo Dorfles. Indexes. A fine copy.
- Franco Maria Ricci & Corinna Ferrari [Editors]: TOP SYMBOLS & TRADEMARKS OF THE WORLD 10 [1979 / 1980 Annual]. Milan: F. M. Ricci / Deco Press, 1981. First edition. Duodecimo. Black fabricoid with white silk screen decoration. Black endpapers. [Unpaginated] 738 marks reproduced in black and white accompanied by full producton credits. Introduction by Vittorio Sgarbi. Indexes. A fine copy.
- Franco Maria Ricci & Corinna Ferrari [Editors]: TOP SYMBOLS & TRADEMARKS OF THE WORLD 11 [1981 / 1982 Annual]. Milan: F. M. Ricci / Deco Press, 1983. First edition. Duodecimo. Black fabricoid with white silk screen decoration. Black endpapers. [Unpaginated] 749 marks reproduced in black and white accompanied by full producton credits. Introduction by Corinna Ferrari. Indexes. A fine copy.
This complete set includes thoughtful international introductions from François Barré, Stane Bernik, Pieter Brattinga, Gillo Dorfles, Jupp Ernst, Corinna Ferrari, Colin Forbes, Martin Gavler, Vittorio Gregotti, Grega Kosak, Burton Kramer, Tomás Maldonado, George Nelson, Hans Neuburg, Juan Perucho, Décio Pignatari, and Vittorio Sgarbi.
Includes work by Paul Rand, Louis Danziger, Herbert Leupin, Yusaku Kamekura (many examples), Morton Goldsholl, Ladislav Sutnar, Joseph Binder, Hans Schleger, Hiroshi Ohchi, Hans Hartmann, Alvin Lustig, Carlo Vivarelli, Jupp Ernst, Walter Herdeg, Honneger-Lavater, Meier Menzel, Charles Dean, Bruno Munari, Jacques Nathan, Max Koerner, Pierre Gauchat, Donald Brun, Albert Ruegg, F. H. K. Henrion, Anton Stankowski, Jean Colin, Jean Picart Le Doux, Lucien Bernhard, Hans Neuburg, Studio Boggeri, Andre Masson, Walter Diethelm, Ashley Havinden, George Tscherny, Kenji Ito, Herbert Bayer, George Nelson, Max Huber, Sori Yanagi, Herbert Spencer, Celestino Piatti, Taylor Poore, Isamu Noguchi, Milner Gray, David Stone Martin, Albe Steiner, Raymond Loewy Associates, Jan Tschichold, George Salter, Ernst Keller, Paul Klee, Herbert Matter, Leo Lionni, Marcello Nizzoli, Heinz Waibl, Karl Gerstner, Saul Bass, and hundreds of other graphic designers from around the globe.
Top Symbols & Trademarks of the World was the efforts of Franco Maria Ricci & Corinna Ferrari, and Italian publisher Deco Press. The series, published in 1973 was an unprecedented initiative to catalogue many of the finest examples of trademark design of the time. What marks this series out is both the format and the approach Ricci and Ferrari took.
The books are conveniently compact relative to other publications of the same period, offering a practical easy-to-handle reference tool. Each of the volumes is a slim hardback edition with a white silk screennprinted cover and carrying around 700 trademarks each. These are collated geographically, which leads me to the editorial approach. It was common for logo books to source their collections, not just from designers, but from earlier publications. This, having spent nearly a decade archiving logos, led to the poor and inaccurate reproduction of many of the logos. Fine lines disappear and ink bleed eventually becomes a puddle. Ricci and Ferrari worked directly with the designers to source the original files and complete information. It is not entirely accurate, a couple of the examples are upside down (Yamada Lighting Co. by Mitsuo Katsui, Volume 3), and incorrect information but this is a tiny fraction of the nearly 8,000 logos across the eleven volumes.
The series is, for the most part, split by country but where there are fewer examples, countries have been grouped together (Japan, Spain & Latin America) or in the case of the United States, split into two parts due to the sheer volume of work generated by the country. Volume 2 feature United States Part 2 and Canada. While the trademarks collated vary in their quality, the mid-century, a period of vast modernisation across the western world can be recognised as a driving force behind much of the work and across many of the countries. However, it is the essays that proceed the trademarks that are the real highlight, charting the developments of corporate identity design for each country represented by each volume, with a few exceptions, there's no essay for Japan. These are authored by designers from each of the countries and include the likes of Canadian designer Burton Kramer and American designer George Nelson for Volume 1 and British design Collin Forbes for Volume 4. While there is a strong modernist quality that proliferates, the essays and the collation of logos by countries do real certain commonalities and differences. For instance, Volume 3 sees quite a transition from Japan to Spain, with the former employing far more circular forms and allusions to natural phenomena, and the latter irregular forms and wider compositions. This of course, is shaped by the selection process and preferences of the editors, but the essays somewhat help to ground these in cultural specificities. It is a lovely series to have, a full set takes up very little room, offers access to 7000+ logos from the 1940–70s, and very easy to handle for referencing.