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LBSU Grad Helped Design Patriots Logo
by Bill Plashke, Los Angeles Times
January 20, 2008
The most unlikely team on today's NFL playoff fields will not be from
San Diego.
The most bizarre team in today's NFL conference championship games has
nothing to do with New York.
The most amazing team is not led by Brett Favre, and the most prolific
team is not featuring Tom Brady.
The coolest of all teams lives not on your TV screen, but in an
anonymous brick building next to a nail salon on a busy street in
Culver City.
There are no signs out front.
There is really only one notable sign inside, a tiny photo in the
middle of a wall filled with tiny photos.
Fifteen years ago, on a drafting table in the middle of this building,
a designer and his college intern casually doodled the logo on that
photo.
They were answering a request from a company down the street to draw
something to be worn by a football team.
It was hilarious, because neither man was really a football fan.
It was improbable, because the team played in the biggest sports
league in the country, and this company's claim to fame was album
covers.
But it was Los Angeles, so why not?
"We were like, OK, cool," said Ken Loh, the intern.
The initial doodling took about 30 minutes.
The total payment was $12,000.
Fifteen years later, it has become the drawing of a lifetime, a symbol
that has made millions, a logo that could soon be imprinted in the
history books.
That thing on the New England Patriots helmet?
That belongs to the designer and the intern.
That thing in the middle of the New England Patriots' field, in the
middle of every piece of Patriots memorabilia, in the center of the
football universe that revolves around what is potentially the best
team in history?
That belongs to the designer and the intern.
Who have been rewarded with no profits, no fame, and not even any free
tickets to the games.
As far from the NFL and believability as humanly possible, Stan
Evenson of the Evenson Design Group teamed with intern Loh to design
the funky Patriot with a star on his hat and a flag shooting out of
his head.
Said Evenson: "Looking back, I just have to laugh."
Said Loh: "Even today, people are like, 'Are you kidding me?' "
Today, Evenson's eight-person firm is in its third decade, authoring
many other logos and prominent designs. Loh lives in Orange County and
runs the website for the sportswear company Oakley Inc.
But in many ways, they will always be a team, and they will always have
a team.
Said Evenson: "I'll be working out at the gym, the guy next to me
will
be talking about the Patriots, and I'll be like, 'Oh, by the way . . .
' "
Said Loh: "I refer to the Patriots as 'we,' because, why not? That's
my drawing they're wearing on their heads."
The other day, Evenson was walking through his modest office space,
polling workers on whether the company should hold a Super Bowl party
if the unbeaten Patriots are playing.
One worker looked up from sketches ordered by a movie client.
"You gonna have a keg?" she said.
This is not football country. The Evenson Design Group's biggest
sports clients, besides the Patriots, have been a high school program
and a WNBA team.
"But around here, we're open to anything," Evenson said with
a grin.
Fifteen years ago, Evenson was open to using a Long Beach State intern
named Ken Loh.
When he received a memo from NFL Properties, which then had an office
in Culver City, he was also open to the strange request.
"The New England Patriots are seeking a new visual identity for their
football team. . . . This is definitely a creative challenge, because
they have not indicated a specific icon or symbol for us to explore."
So they could design a football logo with no parameters. The only
thing certain was that they did not want it to be like the old
Patriots logo, a smirking Minuteman in a three-point stance.
Said Evenson: "It was the ugliest logo around. I figured we could
do
something more streamlined."
Evenson was a career designer who had done no previous sports work.
Loh was a 23-year-old college student who had never attended an NFL game.
A company sales representative knew the folks at NFL Properties, who
contacted her only because they were looking for something different.
There would be other design firms involved. It was a low-paying
audition with little hope.
Loh began idly doodling.
He quickly drew a stylized face underneath a Minuteman cap and threw
in a trailing flag.
It was the same kind of doodle that his family and friends had seen on
his scrap paper for years.
"My brother saw it and said, 'I've seen that face, that's the face
you
use for everybody you draw,' " Loh said.
Later, when traditional Patriots fans became angered at the logo, they
referred to it as "the Flying Elvis" because they thought the
man had
Elvis Presley sideburns.
"That's not sideburns, that his cheek," Loh said with a chuckle.
Although the drawing took only 30 minutes to sketch, Evenson and Loh
worked for a week to hone it, then hurriedly submitted it.
When they were later told that incoming owner Bob Kraft had chosen it
-- it was actually installed that summer under former owner James
Orthwein -- they were in shock.
"The next season, I remember the first time I watched the Patriots
play on TV, and I couldn't believe it," Loh said. "I was like,
'Wow,
that's my work.' "
Even more surprising is that, after being paid $2,500 for the initial
sketching, they received only an additional $9,500 for winning the
bid.
At that time, such work usually would command more than $100,000.
"Sports leagues know that most design firms will do their work
cheaply, because they want the publicity," Evenson said.
And . . . ?
"Well, yes, you cannot put a price on the kind of good publicity
that
this logo has brought to us," he said.
Evenson uses the logo in many of his presentations. Loh used the logo
to help him get his next job.
Although Evenson says he has never seen the Patriots play, Loh attends
their games on the West Coast, and once even flew to Boston during the
off-season to walk on his giant midfield drawing.
Nothing, however, could match the reward of the moment.
For that semester, the designer gave the intern an A+.
And for that logo, the designer gave the intern a $500 bonus.
Which Ken Loh used for, what, tuition? Books? Food?
Oh, be serious.
"I used the money to buy a bunch of Patriot gear," Loh said.
"Lots of
Patriot gear."
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