Scottish Parliament logo storm

A fierce debate over a logo for the Scottish Parliament is continuing to rage as Scotland’s colleges return after the summer break.

The decision to invite Scottish design students to create a marque for the new Scottish Parliament has been attacked by a number of design professionals across the country, including Tayburn Group chief executive Erick Davidson.

David Herbert, the head of graphics at the University of Dundee’s Duncan of Jordanstone faculty, has now declined an invitation for his students to take part in the competition in response to industry pressure. He was unavailable for comment as Design Week went to press.

Other schools are not so quick to be moved. Glasgow School of Art head of visual communications Ian McLaren says he fully supports the competition, which does credit to the professionalism of his students.

“The real money will be made for the implementation side of the work and we will not be encouraging our students to submit entries for that,” he says. “We are only allowed to send one submission per college,” he adds.

Sir David Steel announced the competition in June in his capacity as presiding officer of the Scottish Parliament. The logo will be based on the identity guidelines created by Edinburgh consultancy Redpath (DW 14 May).

Redpath was commissioned by the Scottish Office to develop a prototype identity to incorporate a future marque, but was not consulted about the competition.

Redpath managing director Richard Irvine says that although the competition is going ahead, it is not even known for certain if the winning design will be used.

“There is also the question of how many logos are needed. We have already said we think there should be two: a constitutional marque to sit on legislation documents and a more general one for branding,” he says.