Bristol is the name of a defunct automobile manufacturing brand, which was established in the United Kingdom in 1945. The brand was famous for its luxury cars, which were pretty popular among connoisseurs across the globe. Until 1955, the company only produced cars on its engines, but later started using Chrysler and BMW.
The visual identity of Bristol hasn’t changed much throughout the years — its main element has always been a heraldic crest, celebrating the motherland of the company, a city in the South West of England, Bristol.
For the first few years, the crest was pretty colorful — with blue waters, a yellow clipper, a red sky, and a white tower on a cliff. It was usually placed on a glossy black rectangular badge with a sleek silver outline and the uppercase inscription in the same color. The badge had its inner angles rounded, and the outer ones — sharp.
After the redesigned the Bristol identity, the badge of the brand became circular and stayed like that till the last days. The new emblem featured the same historical crest in the middle, though this time the element was executed in black and white. The crest was placed on the inner circle of the emblem, which was colored red and had a white outline.
The red circle was outlined in black and had an arched “Bristol” inscription written in white on the upper part of the black frame, which was also outlined in white.
There was also a version of a text-based logo for Bristol cars, which was usually placed on the back. It was a silver script lettering with thick smooth lines, looking very traditional for its times.
The lettering on the Bristol badge was pretty modest — all capitals in a medium-weight sans-serif typeface with clean contours and a lot of air between the letters. It looked professional and calm, evoking a sense of trustworthiness and responsibility. As for the cursive inscription, which could be seen in silver metal, it featured thin yet distinct lines with smooth angles and very delicate curves of the letters’ tails.
The red, white, and black color palette of the Bristol visual identity is a sleek and strong combination, which stands for power, passion, and confidence, and this is how the brand wanted their customers to feel on the roads when driving one of the Bristol cars.