When the Friends of the Petrie Museum (PMF) was first established Barbara Adams, the curator of the Petrie Museum at that time, hand-drew a logo for exclusive use by the Friends. This logo was designed around a cartouche which contained a scarab beetle underneath a sun-disc containing W. M. Flinders Petrie’s head. The original drawing of the logo is retained in the Petrie Museum stores.
Barbara’s cartouche logo has been used in slightly different sizes and formats over the years on the Friends’ magazine and the website, but it did not feature on the more recent email templates, postal mailings, or on social media accounts. With the Friends transition to a registered charity the Board has decided that a stronger and more unified approach is needed towards branding. These discussions were also held in conjunction with formalising the Friends’ mission and vision, and the direction in which the charity wants to move forward.
The Board wanted to retain the connection to Barbara Adams and the lineage of the logo, which has been used in one form or another since 1988, all agreeing that the scarab had a wonderfully hand-drawn quality. Not only is this hand-drawn quality a connection to Barbara and the other founders of the Friends, it also has more personality than a purely computer-drawn image. Therefore, the new 2022 version of the logo takes the scarab from Barbara’s original cartouche design and combines that with the name of the Friends. The scarab is then also used alone for the social media icons, which require round shapes.
The orange colour was chosen to partly symbolise the warmth and friendliness of the Friends and also to evoke the Egyptian sun. There are also black and white versions of the logo, which will be used when the coloured option is not appropriate – for example on the printed mailing.
This new logo has been created as a vector graphic, which allows the design to be infinitely scaled up or down for use in different projects and on different media. This allows the Board to contemplate new uses for the logo and opens up new possibilities such as merchandising and other fundraising activities.