The mountain is an ambiguous symbol. On the one hand, the ancient peoples represented the mountain peaks as sacred places where the gods live. A good example is Mount Olympus, which, according to the Greeks, was ruled by Zeus. On the other hand, in many cultures, rocks and hills were considered a refuge for unclean forces, because witches and sorcerers gathered there on certain days to perform their rituals.
In today’s world, of course, associations have changed. Now the mountains symbolize purposefulness, reliability, constancy, stability, steadfastness, superiority, and eternity. White snow-capped peaks represent purity, and the hard climb is compared to a spiritual ascent. In turn, the peak is a desirable goal, and its achievement is comparable to realizing a cherished dream.
Inviolability, stability, confidence – all these qualities are embodied in logos depicting mountains. Not surprisingly, they are part of the visual identity of many companies, including world-famous ones. The image of an invincible peak enhances any brand’s image and creates a feeling of strength and invulnerability. Let’s take a look at the most popular mountain emblems that are currently in use or used in the past but have gone down in history as successful examples of identities.
Mount St. Mary’s Mountaineers
When creating the Mount St. Mary’s Mountaineers logo, the designers decided to play with team names. To do this, they slightly raised the central part of the phrase “THE MOUNT,” creating a semblance of a hill, and depicted a mountain peak on top. The triangular hill symbolizes Mount St. Mary, after whom the university and its athletic program were named. The inside of the figure is brown, but white lines pierce it. This is how stylized snow looks in the minds of artists. The letters have a light beige gradient. The base of the inscription and the general outer contour are painted dark blue. The triangular serif typeface balances out the pointed shape of the mountain.
West Virginia Black Bears
The West Virginia Black Bears varsity baseball team has a logo that contains its name, which is divided into two parts. The first half is in an orange ring surrounding black and blue mountains. Such a landscape is characteristic of West Virginia because the official nickname of this area is the “Mountain State.” Sharp peaks rise against the backdrop of the moon, depicted as a baseball. The head of a disgruntled bear is drawn in the lower half of the circle, and below it is a white handwritten inscription “Black Bears.” The words are raised diagonally as if this is also some kind of elevation.
Johnson City Cardinals
The designers who designed the logo for the Johnson City Cardinals depicted a range of seven mountain peaks on it. This is a reference to the landscape where Johnson City is located, the valleys at the foot of the Appalachian Mountains. The name of the locality is written in white letters along the dark blue horizon, and below is the large red word “Cardinals.” The artists have drawn a cartoon bird from the cardinal family on the right side. Her wings resemble arms because she is holding a baseball bat. At the same time, the flying white ball adds energy and dynamics to the emblem.
Toblerone
Chocolate bar brand Toblerone has perhaps one of the most famous logos on this list. It is known not only by sweet lovers but also by those who have seen triangular chocolate only on the shelves. The symbol consists of a yellow mountain peak with white stripes of snow that form an invisible silhouette of a bear. This is a stylized Matterhorn – the most famous pyramidal mountain in the Pennines. The manufacturer’s name is written under the bottom, for which the designers used a bold font of their own design. Letters with a red gradient, gold outlines, blue shadows, and short triangular serifs make the composition voluminous.
Idaho Falls Chukars
This professional football club loves its homeland very much, so it dedicated an entire emblem to it. Since the city of Idaho Falls is located in the Rocky Mountains, the Idaho Falls Chukars sports team’s logo contains an image of a chain of mountain peaks. White stands for snow, and gray stands for rocks that emerge from the mist. In the foreground, the word “Chukars” is written in stylized black letters. In the “C” bend, a formidable bird with red eyes and a beak is drawn. The first two words of the name are painted in the same dark crimson hue and are slightly higher against the background of the mountains.
Tipos Extraliga
In the Slovak hockey league Tipos Extraliga, the logo is associated with frosty freshness, ice, and cleanliness. The base has the shape of a shield with a sharp bottom. The top half depicts three blue mountain peaks with white snow caps. They have the word “TIPOS” in bold italics and “Extraliga” in thin, straight letters. The second part of the shield is red with a gradient. Against such a background, the white silhouette of a hockey player stands out well, who is dressed in full equipment, holds a stick in his hands, and is about to hit the puck.
Evian
Evian is one of the few non-sports brands on the list. This is a bottled mineral water manufacturer produced in the mountainous region of France – in the heart of the French Alps on the border with Italy. Considering the brand’s specifics, the designers created a logo for Evian with the image of mountains. They got three gray peaks of an indefinite shape. The emblem developers made the background completely white to show that the rocks are covered with snow. And at the bottom, in lowercase, but large sans-serif letters, the name of the brand is written. The red color of the word creates contrast.
Sierra Mist
Sierra Mist is another brand of water, this time carbonated and diluted with lime and lemon juice. Here, the snow-covered peaks on the emblem are not associated with any specific mountains. At Sierra Mist, the logo symbolizes the freshness of the drink and its ability to quench thirst. To do this, rocky peaks are combined with a slice of citrus, which is simultaneously similar to lime and lemon due to its yellow-green color—a three-level diagonal inscription between the white-gray mountains and the colorful slice of fruit. The first two lines contain the brand name, which consists of bold letters with triangular serifs. And at the bottom is the phrase “LEMON LIME SODA.”
Coors Light
For Coors Light beer, the logo with the mountain is a way to show the freshness and coolness of the alcoholic beverage. In one version, the peaks were depicted as two connected triangles in light gray and served as the basis for the dark red word “Coors,” which was written in italic cursive. The title’s second half was slight to the right on the same line. The designers composed it with dark gray uppercase letters, using bold sans serifs with clipped lines on some of the glyphs.
Asheville Tourists
The Asheville Tourists baseball club also has mountains in its logo, although they look more like high hills here. Their silhouette is dark blue because the designers chose to depict a night landscape with stars, the moon, and a comet flying past, which is a falling ball. The moon casts a silver-blue light on the peaks. The contour of the emblem is circled in exactly the same color, and the word “ASHEVILLE” is painted at the top. Against the background of a circle with picturesque nature, there are a stylized inscription “Tourists.” It is handwritten and contains an “i” with a five-pointed star instead of a dot.
Salem Red Sox
The logo for the Salem Red Sox is a tribute to the city where the baseball club is located. His stadium offers a picturesque view of the mountains, which rise on a dark ridge on the horizon. So the emblem of a sports team contains several blue mountain ranges that differ in shape and shades. A hazy outline occupies the upper half of the horizontal oval, and the bottom is painted over in solid dark blue. In the center, the phrase “RED SOX” is written in curly type, separated by an image of red socks. Above it is the arched word “SALEM.” The lower part is occupied by two lines: “EST. 2009” and “VIRGINIA” with the letter “G” in the form of a swirling arrow.
Colorado Springs Sky Sox
Colorado Springs, like Salem, has its own professional baseball team called the Sox—more specifically, the Sky Sox. Creating a logo for the Colorado Springs Sky Sox, the designers beat the Rocky Mountains on the eastern spurs of which the hometown of the sports club is located. The mountains on the emblem are depicted as rocky peaks with dark and light blue stripes. The team name is written at the bottom, with white letters with a pink outline resembling teeth. Directly above them are two stylized eyes with cloud-shaped eyebrows.
Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference
It is natural that the Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference logo contains mountains because they are mentioned in the name. The designers made them the top of a diamond, and in the lower half, they depicted a landscape of dark blue Christmas trees against an orange sky. The three mountain peaks have the same color scheme, which makes them look like they’re being hit by the morning sun. The structure of the rhombus is broken by the white abbreviation “RMAC,” located inside a dark blue plate in the center of the emblem. Small triangular serifs fit perfectly into the overall geometry.
Aquafina
This list includes another brand under which purified bottled water is sold. For Aquafina, the mountain logo is a symbol of freshness, pleasant coolness, and thirst quenching. At the same time, there is no direct connection with mountain mineral springs because all bottled water is tap water. The artists depicted two peaks with a light gray gradient against a rising red sun. For balance, a blue inscription with large but rather thin letters has been added at the bottom. A special font was designed for the brand name, so both “A” s are disproportionate.
Prudential Financial
In the case of Prudential Financial, the logo is a stylized image of the Rock of Gibraltar. The famous peak is presented in the form of white and blue spots and stripes, which are placed inside the circle. She became the symbol of an investment and insurance company after an advertising agent drove past Snake Hill and was inspired by the beauty of the local landscape. This happened in the 1890s. Since then, the emblem has changed many times until the modern version appeared – a simplified pictogram signed at the bottom with the word “Prudential.”
Colorado Rapids
The designers who designed the mountain logo for the Colorado Rapids dedicated it to the landscape features of the state of Colorado. This is another case where geography is directly reflected in the brand’s visual identity. The mountain peak is depicted as a jagged triangle. Its left side is light gray, the right side is light blue, and a white line is drawn on top, imitating snow. In the center is a soccer ball hovering over the number “96”. The name of the team is written at the top in white letters. All this is placed in an uneven burgundy rhombic shield.
Paramount Pictures
Paramount Pictures has a simple but recognizable logo. It consists of a white silhouette of a mountain against a black semicircle in an arch of 22 stars. It is believed that this image of the top of Ben Lomond in the state of Utah, where the founder of the Hollywood film company comes from. The name of the brand is written in white handwriting above the mountain.
Brumbies
The Australian rugby club Brumbies has adopted a rearing blue horse as the star of its emblem. The fact is that its name refers to wild horses that used to be domestic but then ran away or were set free. As for the mountains, their gray peaks with white patches of snow lay in the background. Those who created the logo for the Brumbies decided to portray the stylized Brindabella Ranges because they are located near Canberra, the birthplace of the rugby club.
Pacific-12 Conference
The Pacific-12 Conference logo looks powerful and modern. Its base is a triangular heraldic shield with a black outline. The interior contains the bright blue number “12” within a white circle and the light letters “PAC” formed by negative space on a dark blue background. From the circle, which is located between the two diagonals “A,” white lines stretch upwards. They form a right angle, similar to a snow-covered mountain peak.
Pacific West Conference
PacWest is another collection of sports teams that uses the mountain peak emblem. The designers created a round-shaped logo for the Pacific West Conference and placed it in a thin black ring. The blue circle contains white elements – the so-called negative space. Three angular lines at the top form the silhouettes of mountains, and a wavy strip drawn below them look like hills on the horizon. Below is a two-line inscription “PacWest CONFERENCE.” Her sans-serif looks balanced against an abstract background.
Appalachian League
In the case of the Appalachian League, the logo resembles a rondel in structure. The central circle depicts the same Appalachian Mountains, after which the sports organization was named. They are painted green and rise against the orange sky, and the foreground is occupied by the forest in the form of a solid dark spot. In a black frame separated by two green lines, the white phrase “APPALACHIAN LEAGUE” is indicated. There are also two ribbons with the inscriptions “EST.” and “1911”.
Outback Bowl
At the Outback Bowl, the logo also contained a mountain, but it was depicted as a long dark red stripe with uneven bumps. A brown boomerang stylized as an American football flew overhead. At the bottom was the name of the championship. The base was a yellow oval in a silver frame with a gradient. This emblem is no longer used because the annual competition has been renamed the ReliaQuest Bowl.
Big Sky Conference
The emblem of this organization contains an expanding blue polygon with inscriptions. The letters on the top line are progressively enlarged to show perspective, to depict three-dimensional space on a plane. Below are white mountains with light blue peaks. The designers who developed the logo for the Big Sky Conference made the landscape look abstract.
Northwest League
Celebrity sports emblem designer Todd Radom created a mountain, water, and tree logo for the Northwest League that matches the geographic features of the Northwest region. These elements are placed in a ring, where the name of the baseball league is indicated. The bright color palette looks stylish and modern.
Northwest Conference
At the Northwest Conference, the logo also did not do without a picturesque mountain; only here, it is presented in the form of a single dark gray stripe. On the left is an abstract green Christmas tree, and below it is a blue river. The abbreviation “NWC” is written at the bottom in block type. The second line contains the full name of the conference.
Allegheny Mountain Collegiate Conference
The mountain logo is a tribute to the native region of the Allegheny Mountain Collegiate Conference. The three white and gray peaks are a stylized depiction of the Alleghenies, who are part of the Appalachians. The emblem also includes three silver stars and the name of the sports organization in sans-serif white letters. The base is a dark blue circle with a transverse inscription “AMCC.”
National Park Service
This federal agency manages all coastal conservation areas and national parks in the United States. Therefore, the National Park Service logo consists of elements related to nature. On the horizon, you can see a mountain with a snow-capped peak; in front of it is a tall tree and many small fir trees. And against the backdrop of a picturesque landscape, a lone bison grazes. The drawing is shaped like an upside-down arrowhead and features white lettering in a sans-serif font.
AIA
American International Assurance is the largest insurance company not only in Hong Kong but throughout Asia. It insures life and provides financial services. At the same time, the AIA logo contains the image of Mount Everest in a white circle with a dark red outline. The vertex is painted with the same colors and appears three-dimensional due to the negative space. In this case, the mountain symbolizes confidence, strength, hope, stability, and inviolability.
