Congratulations to Our Airbnb Logo Design Contest Winner!

We love to run contests to showcase graphic designers, and inspire others whenever possible. Our goal is to build a rich community for designers to compete, share tips and helpful resources. So when we’re inspired to start a contest, we want designers to have fun with them!

Airbnb unveiled their brand overhaul a few weeks ago and it didn’t go over well in the design community. Airbnb’s new logo intended to represent a universal symbol of belonging, but overnight the redesign became an overblown controversy in the design industry. From sexual genitalia comparisons to morphing into a meme on Tumblr, the new Airbnb logo has worked its way around the Internet media as the latest brand fail.

 

ZillionDesigns has risen to the occasion and answered the call to start a logo design contest to design a better Airbnb logo (not that Airbnb ever hired us but we’d like to contribute!).  To all the designers who entered our recent Airbnb logo design contest, we want to thank you all for participating. While this has been a fun and exciting exercise, we had over 860 entries to sift through to choose our favorites – it was not easy!

Initial entries were judged based on originality, relevancy to the theme, and how well the designer understood what the Airbnb brand was all about. From there, we had to narrow down the entries to our Top 5 and opened the voting to the public.

Our poll ended on August 26^h with 1,192 votes- Wow! That’s our largest participation yet! Thank you everyone! With that said, our winner is…. drum rolls…..Designer barainnovations! Yes, you did it mate.

After the polls closed and our winner determined, we’ve decided we wanted to know more about him. We contacted barainnovations, and graciously, he has agreed to answer a few questions for us.

What’s your name? (If you rather go by a handle, that’s fine. Just let us know!)

I want to keep my name reserved, thank you!

Tell us about yourself.

I am a person who always wants to do his best work, to keep my values ​​and principles with great humility and recognizing that it is mainly thanks to God that I can achieve success in all the projects that allows me to undertake.

What inspired you to be a designer?

I always said it was my father who is also a designer, but I know that it was God who predestined for my life with a purpose.

Have you ever faced issues as a designer that made you want to stop designing?

Many times I thought about quitting design to devote to production of TV or something, but God always herded me towards it. So far I have not stopped and I have grown professionally thanks to the Lord.

Do you use the services of Airbnb at all, or know anyone who does?

Honestly no.

What drew you to you sign up for the Design a Better Airbnb logo contest?

Initially because I had never seen ZillionDesign.com sponsor a contest. Then I saw the problem with the current logo Airbnb and wanted to try to see what was going on. It caught my interest!

Have you designed anything for the hospitality industry before?

Yeah, I designed for hotels and travel agencies.

What was it like creating your design? Did it take you a long to come up with your concept?

It actually took longer than expected because at the beginning, I started designing concepts very similar to what all designers were presenting (planes, pin maps, heart, lyrics etc.). My design process was similar to theirs and I wanted something different.

What inspired your design?

Quite simply, every traveler always carries a suitcase. It is what identifies them.

How do you feel knowing your logo was selected? Did you expect it to be chosen?

I didn’t expect to be chosen because I was risking a totally different concept to others. But it worked out and I am very grateful to God.

Do you have any advice you want to share to fellow designers?

A very simple tip of the word of God is in Joshua 1:7-8

“Be strong and very courageous. Be careful to obey all the law my servant Moses gave you; do not turn from it to the right or to the left, that you may be successful wherever you go. Keep this Book of the Law always on your lips; meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do everything written in it. Then you will be prosperous and successful.”

 

Spanish Translation (provided by designer barainnovations!)

Cuál es tu nombre? (Si en lugar de ir por un mango, está bien. Sólo déjame saber!)

Deseo mantener reservado mi nombre, gracias!

Cuéntanos acerca de ti mismo. 

Soy una persona que siempre quiere hacer su trabajo lo mejor posible, guardando mis valores y principios con mucha humildad y sobretodo reconociendo que es gracias a Dios que puedo lograr el éxito en todos los proyectos que me permite emprender.

¿Qué te inspiró a ser un diseñador?

Siempre dije que fue por que mi padre que también es diseñador, pero ahora se que fue Dios quien lo predestino para mi vida con un propósito.

¿Alguna vez ha enfrentado a problemas como un diseñador que te hizo querer dejar de diseñar?

Si claro muchas veces pensé en dejar el diseño y dedicarme a la producción de Television o algo parecido, pero Dios siempre me encaminaba nuevamente y hasta ahora no lo he dejado y he ido creciendo profesionalmente gracias al Señor.

¿Utiliza los servicios de Airbnb en absoluto, o conoce a alguien que lo hace?

Sinceramente no.

¿Qué te llevó a inscribirse para el diseño de un logotipo concurso Mejor Airbnb?

Inicialmente por que nunca había visto que zilliondesign.com patrocinara un concurso, luego que conocí mas a fondo el problema que había con el logo actual de Airbnb lo quise intentar para ver que pasaba con todo esto.

¿Ha diseñado nada por la industria de la hospitalidad antes?

Si claro, he diseñado para hoteles y agencias de turismo.

¿Cómo fue la creación de su diseño? Le tomó un tiempo para llegar a su concepto?

En realidad fue un proceso mas largo de lo que esperaba, por que al inicio empece diseñando conceptos muy parecidos a lo que todos los diseñadores estaban presentando (Aviones, pines de mapas, corazón, letras etc.) y yo esperaba diseñar algo diferente.

¿Qué inspiró su diseño?

Muy sencillo, todo viajero siempre lleva una maleta, es lo que los identifica.

¿Cómo te sientes sabiendo que su logotipo fue seleccionado? ¿Esperabas que fuera elegido?

No esperaba que fuera elegido por que me estaba arriesgando con un concepto totalmente diferente a los demás. pero todo salió y estoy muy agradecido con Dios.

¿Tiene algún consejo que quieras compartir con otros diseñadores?

Un consejo muy sencillo de la palabra de Dios esta en Joshua 1:7-8

 

Thank you designer barainnovations for answering our questions and thank you to everyone who supported our contest! We look forward to holding more contests in the future. Do you have any suggestions for future contests? Feel free to comment below or tweet @zilliondesigns!